Wizards of Waverly
by Mrs-N-Uzumaki
Summary: Things were so much simpler when they were children. But eventually, they all had to grow up and face the world; especially when it went after them. Magic, conflict, and the paranormal never rest.
1. Max's Departure: Part I

**AN:** Recently I started rewatching this show and realised I didn't actually finish it when it was airing. And now I have marathoned through it all and…well you can see where this is going. hEllO fAndOM

The show was pretty good BUT I think Disney took a really solid idea and wasted it on a kid's channel with that infuriating laugh track…and they even added background music on some of the episodes? Like bro, if you're gonna add music, you shouldn't have made it multi-camera. But that rant is for another day.

As much as I love all the characters, I've always had a soft spot for Max and felt peeved every time he was brushed off and side-lined. The writers never gave him a chance and it's such a shame because he had potential to be a great character.

Also, there is a major lacking of Max!whump on this site and I am disappointed in my fellow Waverlies.

So, it starts off as Max-centric but I actually have a plan with all the characters. **I'm splitting this piece of fanfiction into many arcs,** like you would in a TV show. I already have my arcs lined up for me to write. That's if I get that far lol

 **SPECIAL THANKS TO MY EDITOR AND DEAR FRIEND MEGALEGU!** This story would not have gotten this far or even published if not for you.

I nattered enough, on with the story!

Summary: Things were so much simpler when they were children. But eventually, they all had to grow up and face the world; especially when it went after them. Magic, conflict, and the paranormal never rest.

Disclaimer: If I did, it wouldn't be on a kid's channel, I'll tell you that much.

* * *

 **Max's Departure: Part I**

* * *

Max Russo stuffed everything he needed into his duffle bag. It helped that he didn't attach a lot of sentiment to his things, with the exception of his dead pet lizard that his ex never returned, (though it was a moot point, since where he was ultimately heading he'd doubt they'd allow him to keep it).

Having fit his entire life into one bag made his decision easier to follow. After the final blow-out with his dad that evening, he no longer felt welcome to stick around this place he once called home. He couldn't recall when it had gotten so bad. If he could trace it back, he would say things started to slowly spiral downward after the Wizard Competition. He didn't hold a grudge against his siblings, and in a way, a small part of Max felt relief at not having to worry about accidentally blurting out that he was a wizard; having said that, Max no longer felt the need to let his oddities and random balderdash take the lead as often as it used to. He still had fun doing it from time to time though, if not for the amusing reactions from the people around him.

No, what it really simmered down to was the dispute over the way he wanted to run things at the sub-shop. It wasn't the first time his father dismissed all his ideas, but at that point he was practically handing the shop over to his son, and it wasn't like Max had anything else going on, so everything was riding on this plan. Yet his father insisted on not letting him take control of anything, even when his ideas made more sense financially. (This was where Max cursed himself for acting so good at being incompetent all these years; his reputation had preceded him). His father didn't trust him. And if he didn't trust him, he wouldn't give Max the chance to prove himself.

From then on every little argument between them piled on over the years until his high school graduation. Now it was all about college. Max didn't want to waste a good portion of his life and drown in debt just to end up running the family business anyway. His parents disagreed. At some point, it was decided that at least one of their children should be out there experiencing the life of a University student. Justin's clone had done his four years without anyone knowing, Alex took an internship at a gallery in the city straight out of high school, and Max…Max just wasn't interested.

"Of course you should be interested," his parents had told him. "They'll be some of the best years of your life."

Still, Max had insisted that he just wanted to run the family business. And they all said the same thing, _what if it doesn't work out?_

As if he'll run it to the ground, as if he'll screw it up like he did everything else. It didn't used to bother him, their lack of faith. He had to admit it was mostly his fault for letting his childlike wonder run amok all these years. He made his bed and now he had to lie in it.

But that was okay, he was better off on his own anyway. Being the third kid, he had grown to rely on getting things done for himself. (This was partly why when his parents suddenly shown an interest in his future, it threw him off).

In his defence, Max _had_ actually come up with another plan. About a month into his senior year of high school, he went on a field trip to learn about a Marine JROTC program. It lasted for a week and to his surprise, he found it quite thrilling. He also found it entertaining, though he doubted the corporal would agree; he didn't crack a smile at a single witticism Max had made. His jokes were hilarious, thank you very much. He even made the privates laugh, and at that moment, Max pictured himself fitting in quite well there.

On his tip-toes, the youngest Russo passed every room in the apartment, recoiling at the sound of creaking from the wooden floors that should've been refined by now. Sometimes he wished his father wasn't so cheap, one of the many roots of their arguments.

He quickly snagged his helmet and keys by the front door and made his way outside to his Bonneville motorcycle, another topic that made its guest appearance into the most irrelevant conversations. Max referred to it as his pride and joy, his parents referred to it as death on two wheels.

With one final glance behind him, his duffle bag hanging by his shoulder, his figure disappeared into the night.

"So that's it? You're just gonna take off?" Startled, Max whipped his head towards the voice. There sat his sister on a nearby stoop, waiting for him. How the hell-?

"Alex, what're you doing out here in the middle of the night?"

"What am I doing?" She stood her full height. "What're _you_ doing-" she pointed an accusing finger at him in an eerily similar manner to their mother every time one of them broke her lamp, "-taking off at one in the morning?"

Max set his bag down. "There's nothing left here for me, Alex."

"Wow, doesn't that make me feel better."

"I didn't mean it like that."

"And what, we're not even worth a goodbye?"

Max looked at her sadly. "I'm not doing this to be a bad brother. It's just easier this way."

"Easier for who?" There was that accusing tone.

"Okay, fine. It's easier for me. I don't do goodbyes." Despite how deep his voice had gotten, it still managed to crack when he got upset.

Alex walked up to him, standing almost a head shorter. It seemed every day Max was growing another inch, and it didn't look like it would be stopping anytime soon.

"Where are you going to go? Have you even thought this through?"

"As a matter of fact I have!" his voice rose, causing Alex to slightly jump in surprise. After Max visibly calmed himself, he continued, "I'm not that little kid who shoves jellybeans into his ears anymore. The world didn't stop when you moved out, Alex."

Max felt a pang of guilt when he began to see tears pooling in his sister's eyes. There was a moment of silence between them.

"What're you gonna do?" Alex said.

"Maybe do some travelling first, see the world. And then head to the Marines."

Alex's eyes widened. She punched her brother in the bicep. "Are you shitting me, you egghead?"

"Stop calling me egghead. And _ow_!"

"The _Marines_? Have you lost your freaking mind? You _don't_ know what you're doing. And to think you almost had me convinced you had a plan-"

"Alex." Max's soft tone put a halt in his sister's ranting. "It's happening."

The tears have now tipped over her eyes and she launched her arms over to hug her little brother tightly before he saw them stream down her cheeks. Her arms wrapped around his torso. He followed suit and rested his cheek by her hair.

"Be careful out there," Alex cried. "And I don't know if you're aware when you signed up but some soldiers don't make it back home. So don't let them send you into combat."

Max chuckled sadly. "I'm aware…and it's not up to me." They pulled apart.

"Fine, just promise me that you'll come back in one piece."

She did not like the look that crossed her brother's face. "Alex, you know I can't make that promise."

Alex felt a twinge in her stomach. Something about the way Max had said it, how his expression twisted into a form she had never before glimpsed on him. He was older, he held himself differently...all those years she had spent teasing and taunting her sibling, she had never considered the possibility that he would grow up. Now she was supposed to picture him in fatigues, carrying a gun? She almost recoiled at the idea.

Slowly, she stepped away, turning her back towards him, unable to fully process everything running through her mind. Unconsciously, her hand gripped the necklace her mother passed down to her - a family heirloom. It was a simple black chord with a silver, Mexican peso coin dangling from it. The emblem depicted an eagle biting a snake in the centre, with _Estados Unidos Mexicanos_ written around it.

She couldn't do this, let Max go off on his own. She was his big sister, she was always told to watch out for him since the day he was born. Alex couldn't let Max leave, especially in such a vulnerable state, having no magical powers anymore.

Wait. Magical powers...

Quickly, Alex gripped the necklace tighter, whispering a protection spell she had memorised. The medallion emitted a faint golden glow as she finished reciting the words. Max may not have his powers anymore but she still did and she'd be damned if she didn't at least give him some level of protection while he was away.

"Max, wait." Her brother turned to face her, having already sat down on his bike, engine roaring.

Alex unclasped the chain and carefully placed it around her brother's neck, leaning in close as she secured it.

Max looked down at the medallion, a hint of wonderment in his eyes. Alex remembered how, in childhood, he had always had that look when she offered to play with him or let him borrow one of her things. The words, " _Really, Alex?_ " echoed in her memory.

She offered him a wobbly smile. "I want you to have it."

"No, Alex. Mom gave this to you." He reached up to detach it but she placed her hand over his.

"It's a loan. So you _have_ to come back and give it to me, got it?"

Max opened his mouth to protest but paused at the determined look on his sister's face. He knew he wouldn't be able to stop her. He nodded, finally, giving her a small smile in return.

Alex removed her hand, wiping at the corner of her eye. "And look at it this way, it'll match your dog tags."

Max gave her one of his mischievous, lopsided grins and she enveloped her arms around him, detecting a whiff of cologne. Since when had Max deviated from his usual overindulgent Axe regimen? Somehow, her brother had gotten caught in something, had changed ever-so-slightly in so many ways that it was impossible to know about until it was staring her in the face.

Privately, Alex wondered if that was purposeful on his part.

Max grazed the top of her hairline with a kiss, an uncharacteristic gesture that caused Alex's eyes to well with tears once more.

"Take care of yourself, sis." He twisted the handle on his bike and took off with a roar.

Alex stepped off the sidewalk and into the street, watching the distance between herself and her brother grow longer.

xXx

 _Two years later…_

Straightening up in his seat, Max peered out the window of the taxi as it slowly inched down the traffic-laden street. His flight back to New York City had felt like it would never end and he couldn't suppress his yawns.

Despite the late hour, the city was bustling, especially in downtown Waverly. Max felt an anticipatory jolt run up through him, coursing along his arms and legs until goosebumps appeared. Reflexively, he reached up to grip the medallion around his neck, the coin still depicting its ferocious image and somehow remaining unscratched and untarnished from the chaos.

After two years of service in the Marines, Max had to admit, he was a little anxious to see how home had changed since he'd been gone. He had been emailing and receiving replies from Alex, but she no longer lived above the sub-shop. Although he hadn't heard anything back from his brother, Alex had sent Justin's wishes in all her emails. With a twinge of sadness, Max had a suspicion his older brother was still angry at him for leaving and not saying a word. As for his parents, every so often he sent postcards with the words _I'm okay_. Every day he suppressed the guilt weighing on his chest at the thought of his mother's constant worry for him.

The decision to come back to Waverly hadn't been an easy one. When reenlisting time came along, he would have simply signed on to do yet another year of service. However, something had been gnawing at him for a while now. He'd been experiencing strange symptoms, headaches that persisted for days, abnormal aches in his arms and back, dizzy spells…he didn't want to push his luck and end up getting sent home in a body bag. He doubted it was _that_ serious but he didn't want to take any chances, especially in another country. So with a promise to return to his fellow bulldogs soon, Max packed his minimal belongings and booked a flight home.

Home. He rolled the word around in his mouth for a moment, contemplating its strangeness. He supposed Waverly _was_ home. He'd grown up there, he'd learned to drive and went to prom there. He argued and laughed with his siblings there. Anyone else would call that home. But would he? Max couldn't think of the answer as the taxi pulled to a stop in front of Waverly Sub-Station.

"This is it," he muttered to himself.

"I know it is!" the taxi driver retorted from the driver's seat. "This is the address you gave me. Now get the hell out!"

 _It's good to be back in New York_ , Max thought, grimacing and paying the man before stepping out onto the sidewalk. The sub-shop always closed by ten o'clock and it was already half past. His mother and father would be cleaning up about now. With any luck, his dad would have forgotten to lock the door, like he usually did and he could just walk in.

He could have called or at least given advance notice that he was coming but he was pretty sure he'd have no idea what to say. _Hey Mom, hey Dad. Sorry I went off to the Marines for two years and never spoke to any of you. I learned how to shoot a gun, isn't that cool?_

Maybe some part of him long ago would have relished this moment, arriving home like a purported badass, sporting some well-defined arms and torso, a tattoo snaking out from under the sleeve of his shirt (his mom was _not_ gonna be happy about that) but – no. All Max felt was a sense of foreboding as he stood in front of the sub-shop. He doubted that anyone would want to run up and embrace him, let alone inquire about his muscle mass.

However – as he'd mentioned – he wasn't feeling normal at the moment. People returned to the place they felt comfortable when they didn't feel right… _right_?

Shaking his head, Max took a deep breath and opened the door.

"We're closed," his father's voice immediately travelled across the shop.

Max's lip twitched, a faint of a smile. "Oh, yeah? What's it take for a guy to get a sandwich around here?"

Jerry, his father, bent over a table and wiping it clean with a rag, straightened up and turned around, most likely ready to chew out another rude New Yorker but he stopped short when he recognised his son.

"Max?" he breathed out, rag dropping onto the floor.

Max shifted his weight from one foot to the other, still holding the duffel bag by his shoulder. "Hey, Dad," he said, his voice coming out low. For a while he didn't know what his father's reactions were going to be – was he gonna yell at him? Lecture him about his departure? _Punch him_? But then…

"Jesus," Jerry said, striding across the room and reaching his son in moments. He grasped him in a hug and Max tentatively embraced him back.

"Jerry, where did you put the-" Theresa walked into the dining area and paused, evaluating the scene and realising immediately who her husband was hugging. " _Max_!" she shouted, half-running, half-walking in her high heels. She joined the hug, peppering her son with kisses on his cheeks.

"Geez, Mom," Max finally let a grin settle on his expression.

"Oh dios mio." Theresa then gave him a swat on the shoulder. "Where have you _been_? Do you know how long I've – we've – been wondering where you _were_? Alex said some business about the Marines and we just couldn't believe…" her voice trailed off as Max's fingers pulled the chain out from under his shirt, on which two dog tags dangled.

"Uh…yeah…Private Russo, at your service," Max attempted to joke but his mother simply looked horrified.

"Private…I…I don't understand…" Theresa still grasped the dog tags with her hand, looking from Jerry to Max and then back at the tags which clearly stated they belonged to:

 **RUSSO**

 **MAX, A. E. A POS**

 **986 46 2707**

 **USMC M**

 **ROMAN CATHOLIC**

"You're here, though," Jerry interrupted, attempting to console Theresa. "So you must be done with it then."

Max adjusted the strap on his duffel bag, feeling uncomfortable to place it down while his mother was still so close to him. It had been a while since anyone had approached him so quickly and personally. It was unnerving.

"I…I can't say for sure whether or not I'm done with…" Max paused. "My service."

Once more, Theresa clasped her arms tighter around Max and said, "I can't believe you're here! Your father and I…we had no idea, mijo, that…" she gave a quick squeeze at her son's bicep, blatantly gawking. She missed the imperceptible twitch near Max's eye when she squeezed.

Jerry took a hold of Max's bag. "Here, let's take this upstairs. You must be tired. Theresa, would you mind closing up?"

Theresa, who was still in state of surprise at her son's unexpected appearance, absently nodded.

On the way up the spiral steps, Max offered to help with his bag but his father waved him off and insisted on doing it himself. Fondly, he smiled at his old man's never-changing stubborn ways.

They reached his room and Max was hit with a wave of nostalgia. He hadn't stepped into this room in two years, and it hadn't changed one bit. The night he left he had cleaned and sorted everything in it. He threw away shit he didn't need, and took the necessities with him; he was surprised at how big the room was after. His bed remained untouched, his desk tidied, and his floor clear of any food stains. Although he was surprised to find the smell of antiseptic roaming.

Hearing his son get a whiff of the air, Jerry answered, "Your mom is always in here cleaning. She wanted to make sure the room was ready for you when you came back."

Guilt and sadness built in Max's chest. "Listen, Dad-"

"No, me first," Jerry interrupted. "I was wrong."

Max's brow rose upwards. Of all the things he imagined his father would say to him the day he'd come back, that wasn't even in the top ten. Then he remembered the man hugged him to the point of suffocation only five minutes ago and any regrets of coming home were squashed.

Jerry continued, "When I woke up that morning and Alex told me you were gone. I-" he cleared his throat. "I honestly didn't know what to do.

"At first I was mad, furious even. I figured once you realised how much work actually goes into the military you'd be heading straight back home, tail between your legs."

And just like that they fell right back into that familiar rhythm. "Gee, thanks for the vote of confidence, Dad."

"Kid, just let me finish-"

"I really don't have the energy for this right now-"

"Please, Max."

Max was surprised to hear the pleading in his father's voice.

Jerry took this as a sign to continue. "In the first few days, I assumed you were coming back in that damn motorcycle of yours. But then more days pass, then weeks," he repressed the sting he felt in his heart, "then years. The more time went by, the more scared I got."

This was unfamiliar territory for Max. "What do you mean?"

"For one thing, you were gone for so long I thought you were de-" he paused, collecting himself. It surprised Max, seeing him like this. The only time his father ever displayed that much emotion was for Alex. "And that meant I had jeopardised my relationship with my son forever."

"Dad-"

"Just listen." Jerry placed his hands on his son's shoulders and slightly shook him with affection. "If I had lost you…I didn't want that stupid fight to be my last words to you."

Max swallowed the lump in his throat.

"I'm sorry. I am so…sorry."

There they were, those words. Max had pictured this moment a hundred times in his head, but he never thought it'd actually happen. Maybe he was dreaming, maybe he didn't pack his bag and flew back, maybe he was still laying on his uncomfortable mattress back at camp. Jerry, his massively pig-headed father who had never believed that he'd amount to anything, had just apologised. This was a historical landmark in their relationship.

"Can you forgive me?"

After a long pause, Jerry was sure that he blew it and Max was going to kick him out, but then his son let out a long sigh and said, "Of course I can forgive you, Dad."

A surge of relief washed over Jerry and they hugged once more, pulling apart when Theresa entered the room a few seconds later. "There's some leftover lasagne in the fridge for you, Max. I'll heat it up."

"As much as I missed your cooking terribly, Mom, I just really wanna crash for the night."

"Of course, mijo." She smiled tenderly. Her husband walked passed her, glancing a final smile at his son and then leaving. Theresa walked up to Max and cupped his face lovingly. He'd grown taller over the past two years, and her heart ached at the realisation that she missed it. She pulled him down to kiss his forehead. "Goodnight, cariño."

"Goodnight, Mom." Theresa was at the door when her son said, "I love you."

She felt her heart swell. "To the moon and back, Maxie."

When his tearful mother closed the door behind her, Max took a deep breath and sat on his old bed. He processed everything that happened; the moment the cab stopped in front of his family's sub-station, seeing his parents again, his father damn well _apologising_. Sure, the damage between them still needed some repair, their relationship was far from 'normal', let alone perfect...however, Max had a feeling that things were looking up and, thinking that, he felt a rush of warmth within him. Earlier, he'd wondered if this was the place he could call home. This feeling, right now...if it wasn't 'home' it was pretty damn close.

Max smiled genuinely for the first time in a long time. It felt good to be back.

* * *

 **TBC**

* * *

 **AN:** I'd give you a link to what the heirloom looks like but ff keeps screwing it up. So I urge you to google "mexican necklace men" and the **second** result should be a six-sided, silver coin with a black cord, and voila!

To add another thing to my list of disappointment, WoWP never focused on the relationship between the other siblings. Don't get me wrong, I love some good bro-sis banter between Justin and Alex, but I think it was adorable how Alex sometimes hugged her tiny brother in the background and it's a shame they didn't explore that more. Even Justin and Max got more scenes.

Oh, and dear readers, don't get too comfortable. It only goes downhill from here.

Review, please? Writers need feedback!

Seriously we gobble that stuff up.


	2. Max's Departure: Part II

**AN:** Thank you to the lovelies who took the time to review! You have no idea how much writers appreciate that :)

 **Warning:** Heads up, expletives ahead.

* * *

 **Max's Departure: Part II**

* * *

Alex slammed the phone down on their latest client. He was an entitled, elitist punk of a client whose daddy paid for his shitty work to be featured on the walls of her gallery.

Okay, so it wasn't _her_ gallery per se, but when she ran one of her own, she sure as hell would know where to tell artists like _Tohu-Bohu_ to stick their paintings.

 _Hehe, Tohu-Bohu,_ Alex mused, _gets me every time._

"Russo!" Alex jumped at the thundering sound of her boss's voice. He stormed in into her office, his expressive hands flailing with his usual theatrics.

If she knew she wasn't about to get a lecture about the importance of sucking up to filthy rich snobs she'd laugh at his eccentrics.

"What did I tell you about giving our clients the patience and respect they deserve?"

"I'm sorry, Mr Saffron, but I'm finding it hard to gather the tiniest possible respect for a man who did most of his installations with macaroni."

"That macaroni piece happens to cost a quarter of a million dollars."

"You're shitting me. Wait, are you sure those extra zeros aren't pen marks? Because that happens when you try to eat your tartufo and write at the same time."

"Stop talking!" Saffron used a 'zip it' notion with his hands. "You are going to call those lucrative highbrows back and ask them to reconsider our spacious and award-winning gallery. I don't care if they ask you to get on your knees and send them a picture. Just do it. Or I will fire you for sure this time."

Alex smirked. "No, you won't."

"No, but it was worth a try." He turned and headed to the door. "Seriously, get it done."

Alex sat back in her chair. To a lot of people, it would seem that Mr Saffron was always riding her ass about her work ethic, but that was just the way they worked. It was a system that kept this gallery going for years. And in a lot of ways, Mr Saffron reminded her of her old principal, which was why she had a soft spot for his quirks and spectacles. Plus, it was always amusing when he wore the tie that matched the colour of his angry vein.

Her office phone rang and Alex groaned, _I am_ not _getting on my knees._

"Saffron Enterprise, manager speaking."

"Alex?"

That wasn't the voice she was expecting. This one expressed unmistakeable arrogance and the tune of a know-it-all. "Justin?" This was unusual, he never called her at work, especially not from WizTech. "Wait, where are you?"

"My office."

"Justin, you never call me from the-" she looked around, making sure she was alone, "- _Wizard World_. What's going on? Oh my God, did you get fired?"

"No!" Justin retorted, insulted by the implication.

"Did somebody die?"

"More like rose from the dead."

"What?"

"Max is back, Alex."

" _What?!_ When did this happen?"

"Last night. Dad called me."

"He spoke to Mom and Dad?"

"Yep."

She paused. "Did _you_ speak to him?"

"Nope."

"Justin!"

"I don't know what you want me to say, Alex."

"I can't believe you're still mad at him."

"Of course I'm mad at him!" Justin said in a rush of anger, a tone he used often when Alex dragged him into her magical hijinks years ago. "What am I supposed to say? _Hey Maxie, thanks for taking off and never telling me_. _It's not like I'm your only brother, why would I possibly warrant a goodbye?_ "

"Okay, _warrant_? You're a glorified, high-school babysitter not Magnum P.I. More importantly, he's our little brother, Justin. He deserves a second chance. Did you want him to come back in a body bag before you finally forgave him?"

She heard him sigh. "No," Justin petulantly mumbled. "Of course not."

"Then grow some balls and talk to him!"

 _"You_ grow some balls!"

"I would, but they don't get me free drinks."

"Ugh, Alex!"

"I'm serious, Justin. Go talk to him."

Justin fell silent. "It's...difficult."

"It doesn't have to be. In fact, I'm going to head there right now. I don't have a problem with Max."

"That's because you got to see him before he left."

Alex paused. She had known that Justin was upset with Max, that much was evident, but there was something underlying Justin's statement, a certain anxiety he felt uncomfortable saying aloud. Alex had her suspicions. At some point, Justin had stopped returning her calls for so long she figured he was doing it on purpose. His anger extended not only to Max, but to her as well. After all, she hadn't woken him up and let him see Max before he left. Alex had had that moment all to herself. Some would say it was petty of Justin, but she knew it was only because he loved their little brother just the same.

"I'll see you at the sub-shop, okay?" Alex said.

Justin grumbled.

" _Okay?_ " Alex said, firmly.

"Yes, alright! Go already!"

She hung up and considered whether she should call Harper, but her friend specifically asked her never to interrupt her during work hours again. Last time Harper's boss from hell gave her an earful and punished her by making her run all the way across town every day of that week to get an 'organic wheat grass and goji berries' sandwich – a sandwich her boss didn't even like. So really, Harper shouldn't be mad when Alex decided to tell her the news about Max later.

Alex yanked her coat from the hanger beside her filing cabinet and left the office. She was almost at the entrance when-

"Where do you think you're going?" Her boss's voice emerged and Alex silently cursed.

She turned around sheepishly. "Home?"

"In the middle of the day?"

"Mr Saffron, please, my brother just returned from the Marines and-"

"Justin's in the Marines?"

"No, my younger brother."

"Oh lord, there's more of you?"

"Don't act like you aren't secretly leaping for joy."

"Russo-"

"I swear I won't ask for anything else…during the week anyway…if you let me go and see my brother." When he didn't show any signs of budging Alex tried a different approach. Channelling her inner Scarlett O'Hara, she continued, "My little brother…whom I haven't seen in two long years…never assuming he would make it back safe-"

"Alright, I get it already." Saffron rolled his eyes. "And you call me dramatic."

Alex raised her eyebrows. "Does that mean-"

"Go," he said, defeated, waving his hands to shoo her away. "Give my salutations to a fellow bulldog."

Alex looked confused. "You were in the Marines, Sir?"

"Good heavens, no. I was a scout's leader."

"Yeah, that's virtually the same," Alex muttered.

"What?"

"Nothing!" She hugged him briefly out the excitement building in her chest. She couldn't believe it, this was finally happening. "Thank you, Mr Saffron!" With that, she headed straight to her parked, old Volkswagen Golf.

xXx

 _Voices floated above him but Max barely had the strength to move his eyelids. There was an unbelievable amount of pain coursing through him, like he was trapped beneath a heavy weight and it was spreading from his toes to the top of his head. They said he was alive...but the pain was unimaginable. He couldn't possibly stay this way for long._

 _What had happened to make him this way? How had he gotten here? Why couldn't he move his eyes? He called out for help. At least, he thought he did. His vocal chords felt like they'd been soldered off. In a panic, he felt his chest heaving. The urge to vomit was swelling within him and that made him panic more; if he couldn't open his mouth, how would he puke? It would get trapped within him, he'd choke. It seemed ludicrous to die in such a way, when clearly something far worse was happening to him._

 _Wait, he remembered...the images flashed back to him in a horrifying array, like jump-cuts of his memory, each far worse than the last. There was an explosion. Oh, God...everyone needed to evacuate before it brought them all down. He opened his mouth to yell, one foot before him, as if to make a break for it, when a hot pain exploded alongside his back, body propelled in the air as if he was weightless. It was too late. The fire consumed them all._

Max shot up on his bed with a yell, breath shuddering, heart pounding, and confusion swimming in his thoughts.

His hand grappled for purchase, feeling cotton sheets in his palm. He was in bed. His bed. The smell of pancakes and bacon wafted under the gap in the door to his room, reminding him that he was at home, not in the desert.

He got up, swaying slightly from the motion. He made it to the bathroom and scrutinised his face in the mirror. Dark circles, mussed up curls, sandpapery jaw, blood-shot eyes. Max recoiled. He hadn't realised the mess he'd sported.

Leaning down, he gathered warm water into his palms and splashed his tired face, wiping any remnants of sleep. His next thought was to shower, but his stomach disagreed. He didn't blame the thing, his mom's cooking had that effect.

He walked down the stairs to find his parents whispering amongst each other, both setting up the table with breakfast. A lot of it.

Were they having a gathering or something?

"Uh," Max felt unsure of himself, standing there and trying to get their attention. "Good morning."

His parents hushed in an instant and found their youngest awkwardly clearing his throat.

"Honey!" Theresa smiled instantly. "Well don't just stand there, come on and sit-" she stopped suddenly. "Oh…my _God_." His mom strode towards him with an expression he hadn't seen since he was six and threw her bras off the balcony, he recalled her very angry voice, " _And did you have to throw my ugliest ones for the world to see?_ " Theresa took a hold of his wrist to pull him over. "Is that a tattoo?!"

Max's eyes widened comically, he mentally kicked himself for forgetting to put on a shirt. He tried to pull away from his mother's grasp, but she always was strong for a woman of her stature.

"Jerry, come and take a look at this!"

Max made another futile attempt to escape before he heard his father make his way round the table and towards him. He looked down at the floor, bracing himself for a barrage of yelling on both sides.

Jerry blinked in surprise. "Oh," he said dully.

Max grimaced, waiting for a lecture. He supposed he couldn't have gotten away with hiding a _sleeve_ of tattoos on his arm. Maybe he should have worn a long-sleeved shirt to breakfast. Or even a shirt. A shirt would have been a spectacular idea.

Jerry got close enough to touch his son's arm. He held his forearm with two hands, a touch gentle as a feather's. Looking up at his son, he asked, "What is all this?"

Max exhaled a shaky breath. He wasn't ready to explain the meaning behind the art.

The sleeve expanded from the top of his right shoulder and stopped just before his wrist. It had taken multiple trips to the parlour to complete but it had been worth it.

Spanning from the top of his shoulder to a few inches before his elbow, was a large eagle, wings spread, sitting atop a globe of the United States. In bolded letters above the eagle were the initials USMC. The words 'Est' and '1775' were under each of the eagle's wings. A banner that ran straight through the image of the globe was the motto of the Marines: 'Semper Fidelis.' Below this, resting in the crook of his arm (a particularly painful spot during the procedure) was a bulldog, wearing a green helmet and a spiked collar. The chain attached to the collar was the regulation one used for dog-tags. This chain snaked down, looping and curving, until an inch before his wrist. Attached to it were five tags, each depicting names: **Hendricks, Robert L. / Solomon, Farah D. / Thomas, Patrick R. / Hein, Joshua D. / Rodriguez, Hilda L. J.** The back of Max's shoulder depicted a Gothic-style cross with a helmet slung across one of the edge of one the points and beneath that, on his forearm was the American flag, the words, **Honour, Courage** and **Commitment** emblazoned across it.

"It's…" Max paused. "It's something I got a while ago," he finally admitted.

"It must have hurt," Jerry said. He sounded surprised that Max had done this. He supposed he was surprised too, when he went into the parlour to talk about having it done. He had been in a bad place at the time and…well, he'd always thought about having a tattoo. At least then he'd had a good reason for one – even if he wished he didn't.

Max shrugged. "I've had worse," he said in attempt to lighten the mood. He looked over to the table. "So…what's for breakfast?"

"Oh!" Theresa brightened. "Well, I know how much you love bacon, so of course we have some of that and then those apple-cinnamon pancakes you love, and we obviously can't forget my mother's omleta – you used to beg me to make them every morning." She paused without warning. "Do…do you still like them?"

Max chuckled at his mother's overzealous efforts. "Thanks, Mom. And of course, I still love them," he said, giving her a brief side-hug. He then walked over to the kitchen, opening a cupboard and rooting inside for a mug. "Is there any coffee?"

"Coffee?" Theresa echoed faintly. "You don't drink any."

Max stood silent, holding the mug, feeling awkward.

Suddenly, Theresa's expression shifted back into a smile. "I'm sorry, Maxie, I just forget that…" she trailed off, the words ' _not everything stays the same'_ were left unsaid.

"It's alright, Theresa," Jerry came up from behind his wife, looping a supportive arm around her shoulders. "Max is still our son. We'll always be his family, that's what matters."

Theresa nodded, wiping at one of her eyes. She turned back to the table and began to attend to the food.

Still feeling awkward, Max made his way over to the coffee machine and was just about to mix cream and sugar into his drink when he heard, "MAX?!"

He whipped around and saw Alex standing in the doorway of the apartment. She looked the same as she had before, long black hair in curled tendrils framing her face, make-up minimal, eyes bright and clad in a knee-length skirt and white satin button-up shirt. She must have come straight from work.

As if his feet were acting of their own volition, Max ran towards his sister, almost giddy. She met him halfway, running and leaping into his arms. Alex buried her face into his bare shoulder. He held her as if she were weightless; years of rigorous exercise and endurance training made holding his 110-pound sister seem effortless.

Jerry and Theresa looked on, both blinking back tears.

Eventually, Max set her down and she let go of her brother. Alex stepped away, giving him an evaluating look. "I thought we agreed! No tattoos!" she scolded. Her tone didn't sound angry but more teasing and implied curiosity. Maybe later on he would give her the gory details of the needle going into his skin. He'd share it with Justin too, but his brother fainted – sorry, took a 'manly nap' – at the mere mention of needles, and there was the fact that he was still pissed off at him.

Max shrugged, a grin forming, akin to the one he had given her the night he left. "A true aesthete appreciates any form of art," he teased back.

"Only hipsters say _aesthete_ ," she mocked, then gave him a playful chin shove with her fist. "I'm just glad you're okay."

Upon seeing his sister again Max's hands instinctively drifted to the back of his neck, nimbly detaching the medallion she'd lent him dangling beneath his sternum. "Here," he placed the necklace in her hand. "It was a loan, wasn't it?"

Alex nodded through her watery eyes, smiling down at the Mexican peso coin. "It was. Thank you…for this and for coming back." Her eyes roamed around the room until she caught sight of her parents. "Hey!" she waved.

"You know, Max, this may be the first time your sister has shown up without needing help or money," Jerry observed wryly.

"Hey!" Alex pivoted to face her father. "Who said I didn't need any money?"

Max chuckled and the four of them sat down at the table, Theresa doling out multiple helpings to her son and insisting on refilling his milk glass because "even though you're older, it doesn't mean you don't need calcium anymore!".

"So there was this artist named Tohu-Bohu trying to get into my gallery," Alex said to her brother, spreading jam across a piece of wheat toast.

Max, spearing egg onto his fork, laughed. "Tohu-Bohu? Are you serious?"

Alex nodded. "Deadly."

Max paused, feeling his stomach churn. Something about the finality of the word, the way Alex's lips formed the syllables, unnerved him. She was saying something else about the artist and he leaned in to hear.

"…does his art with _macaroni_ …"

Theresa, nearby, was spraying out the kitchen sink with a nozzle, the loud _whoosh_ of the water making Max reminiscent of a storm he'd had to take cover in. His hand rose to the top of his head, palm rubbing across his curled tresses, half-expecting them to be wet with rain.

"…my boss _insists_ that I 'give him respect…'"

Jerry shook his head. "You never were good with respecting authority. Remember that fireman's presentation in your kindergarten class? He told you guys to practise stop, drop and roll and you told him that you didn't want to wrinkle your dress, so you'd rather just be on fire instead."

"It was metaphorical fire!" Alex protested. "We were never in any danger. I didn't see the point of pretending like we were."

Max's head jerked up with a sudden start, remembering his dream. The consuming fire, the white-hot eruption of pain along his body. He felt something within him move without warning and _oh_ –

He quickly leapt up from the table, disrupting the silverware and Alex's tea mug, which she saved in the nick of time before it spilled along the tablecloth. "Max?" she asked with concern, watching him run up the spiral staircase and out of sight.

Max skidded down the hallway in his socked feet, making it to his bathroom and flipping up the lid on the toilet. His body shuddered with the urge to quell the impending vomit but he was helpless to prevent it. _Fire_ brought him back to his dream, the other half of the nightmare hadn't been re-lived but he didn't have to go over it in his mind to remember…laying in the hospital bed, arm blackened like coal, wrapped in gauze, lifting a hand to his face and seeing red, raised bumps along his skin.

He vomited, hands gripping the sides of the porcelain bowl as he expelled the omleta he had just eaten.

Max didn't register the pounding of feet down the hallway but the door swung open and Alex was by his side instantly, rubbing the bare skin of his back. Her palm was cool, soothing what he believed to be scorching skin. After a moment, he slid down onto the floor, cheek resting against Alex's thigh.

" _A mí la muerte me pela los dientes_ ," he mumbled, words muffled against the fabric of Alex's skirt.

"What?" Alex peered down at her brother, eyebrows furrowed together in confusion at the state Max was in. Since when did Max speak Spanish?

"I threw up the best omleta I've ever had," Max groaned, face turning upward to look his older sister in the eye.

"There's still more downstairs if you'd like to puke again," Alex teased, running a hand through her brother's closely-cropped hair.

"Ugh," he slid off of his sister's leg and forced himself to stand, Alex standing up with him.

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine. Sorry, I had shellfish on the plane."

"Shellfish?" Alex raised her eyebrows. "You hate seafood."

Max's expression froze for a moment, looking momentarily contemplative. "I used to," he said quickly. "But now I like it. Kinda like how I like coffee now."

Alex gave him an evaluating look and then shrugged. "Alright."

"Anyway..." Max's voice trailed off. "I really wanna get this smell off me, so I'm gonna shower now."

Alex nodded, turning to leave the bathroom but Max said softly, "Hey, Alex?"

"Yeah?" she turned around, facing him with a curious expression.

"Would you mind not telling Mom and Dad about this?" Max asked, somewhat sheepishly. "It's just that…I don't want them to worry. They've already had enough of that the past two years."

Alex nodded slowly. "Alright," she said finally. After a moment, she added with a wry grin, "We'll spare them the gory details of how you threw up whole chunks of green pepper from your omelette."

"Ugh! Gross!" Max wrinkled his nose. "You _looked_?"

"It was right in front of me, Max, kinda hard not to."

"Still. That's disgusting."

Alex shoved him playfully. "Not as disgusting as the time you tried to 'create life' out of all the foul things you found under your bed."

Max scrunched up his face. "Don't remind me. I just might puke again."

Alex chuckled. "Take your shower. I'll see you downstairs." She closed the door behind her and trotted back to the dining room table, where she was met with a barrage of questions. "He's fine," she reassured her parents. "He just...wanted to shower… _badly_."

"Since when does Max care so much about personal hygiene?" Theresa asked. The boy used to let grime seep through his room. On purpose.

Alex shrugged and reached for some food. "Ooh, bacon!"

Theresa lightly slapped her hand away. "Ah-ah! No bacon for you."

"Bu-wh-" Alex began, intending to retort with "what did I do?".

"You didn't tell us your brother was coming back," her mother answered. "We stood there gaping at him like idiots last night."

"I didn't know he was coming back," Alex said, defensively. "I haven't heard from him in over a month."

"Well, this is probably why. Maybe he wanted to surprise us?" Jerry said.

"Yes, that," Alex said, making her point by aiming a forefinger at her father. "Can I have my bacon now, please? I didn't have time to eat this morning."

"Mija!" her mother scolded. "What did I say about skipping your breakfast?"

"I had a healthy and hearty breakfast the other day," Alex insisted. "Chocolate cake and an iced mocha. It was amazing."

"The sugar!" Theresa gasped, as if scandalised by her daughter's glucose intake.

The young wizard smiled at her mother and again reached for a piece of bacon, munching on it loudly in victory.

Several minutes later the door to the apartment swung open and Justin walked in, clad in the traditional black wizard robe. He hung it up on the rack next to the bookcase. Now he wore a suit and tie. WizTech didn't have a strict dress code; they did wear robes over their 'civilian' clothes, anyway. However, Justin was insistent. Alex always poked fun at him for it.

"Hey!" Justin smiled, eyes searching the room for his younger brother. "Where's Max?"

"Right here." Max jogged down the spiral staircase, wearing a pair of blue jeans and a white cotton t-shirt. His dog-tags dangled from his neck, making a _clink_ noise as they brushed together. He rubbed the plush towel from the bathroom against his hair, making it rise up, looking familiar to the hairstyle he'd sported in adolescence.

Both brothers looked at each other for a long moment, each one hesitant to make the first move. Finally, Max walked over to Justin, slowly proffering his hand.

Justin reached out to shake it, eyebrows furrowed together, as if he didn't understand the gesture. Then, shaking his head, he wrapped his left arm around his brother, enveloping him in a tight hug.

Alex pretended to miss the way Max's eyes squeezed shut tightly.

Justin's hand rested atop the crown of Max's head. Whispering to him, he asked, "How are you doing?"

"I'm alright," Max mumbled into his brother's button-up shirt. "Thanks for coming."

"Hey." Justin pulled his brother away from him, putting a fraction between them. "I hope I never gave you the impression that I wouldn't. You're my brother, man…" he couldn't finish the sentence, not wanting to reveal much more - at least, not with everyone staring.

Then, as an afterthought, Justin asked, "Wait - are those tattoos?"

Max looked at his right arm as if he had forgotten it was there. "Oh," he said softly. "Yeah."

Justin swallowed - audibly. "Oh, um, wow. That's…"

"Watch out!" Alex called from across the room. "He's about to take another 'manly nap'!"

Justin quickly righted himself, shaking out his suit jacket with an indignant huff. "I'll have you know, Alex, I actually _was_ taking a nap. It's a real condition! It's called narcolepsy."

Alex smirked. "Did you Google that before or after you fainted in front of everyone?"

Justin grumbled something unintelligible under his breath.

"It was pretty gross," Max admitted, egging Justin on. "One time, there was this big patch of blood right here," he gestured to his forearm. "It was like, _dark_ red and oozing…"

Justin lurched forward. "Oh, God. Alright, just stop, will you!"

"It's as if he never left," Theresa said lovingly from her position by the sink.

"You won't be so happy about it in a week's time," Jerry muttered as he refilled his coffee mug.

"Oh, don't listen to your father," Theresa said dismissively. "He'll love having some more help around the shop again."

About an hour after they finished eating, Justin received an emergency wand call from the school and had to take off. Their parents had delayed opening sub-shop long enough - Max was secretly touched that his dad had agreed to close it in the morning just so they would spend breakfast together - and went down to re-open it for the lunch rush.

Alex then turned to Max and insisted on showing him the apartment she shared with Harper. He smiled at the thought of seeing Harper and her colourful wardrobe again…which was exactly what he saw when they walked through the front door, finding her sewing orange peels on some jeans. Trust that some things never change.

"Before you come in," Harper said, still focused on her fruit pants, "I need you to take the trash out because it's your turn-" Alex and Max exchanged smiles cheekily, "-and I'm not going to show up to work with garbage juice all over my shirt again!"

Max spoke up, "Why don't I help?"

At the unexpected sound of a man's voice Harper's head shot up to find Max standing in the middle of her small living room. Oh. _Oh._ The once skinny, pre-pubescent boy she had known grew into, well...a _man._ Even in a simple t-shirt and jeans, Harper could tell that Max's muscles were well-defined, most notably in his arms. And was that a tattoo?

"Max?!" she exclaimed. "Oh my God!" Jumping up from her seat, she rushed to hug him tightly.

Max reciprocated the gesture, hunching downwards to Harper's height. He had to admit he almost didn't recognise her. She wore a sleek and professional, navy blue dress, a thin brown belt around her midsection, with a pink cardigan over the top and brown high-heels. Her hair was shorter and darker, fashionably curled.

"Wow, Harper, you look-" Max wasn't quite sure how to bring up the fact that she looked almost underweight.

"Like Skeletor, minus the big muscles? Yeah, well, 'Medusa' never lets me take the elevator."

"How high up in the building do you work?"

"On the 20th floor," she sighed sadly. Before Max delved into her work life Harper instantly bombarded him with questions. "But, oh my gosh, _you_! How are _you_? When did you get back? _How_ did you get back? Can I see your dog-tags?" Without warning she pulled his tags down to her height, causing him stoop lower in surprise.

" _Oh_ , okay." Max's head visibly shook from the amount of questions thrown at him. He picked one and answered, "I got back last night."

"Last night?" She turned to glare at Alex. "Thanks a lot for telling me!"

"Hey, you're the one who told me never to interrupt you during work hours. So…you're welcome."

Before Harper could retort the sound of beeping interrupted her. "Oh shoot," she said, checking her phone. "I have to go."

"Your boss again?" Alex asked. "Doesn't she ever give you a break?"

Harper smiled ruefully. "I wish. Bye, Max, I hope to see you soon," she embraced him quickly and then rushed out of the apartment - at least, rushed as quickly as she could while in high heels.

"Who does Harper work for?" Max asked.

"Some fashion company," Alex brushed off his question. "Now back to me. About this pasta snob…."

Alex continued filling in Max about her job and life in the city, how she bumped into Dean again before he moved to Chicago, how Mason's jealousy issues became too much for her to handle and broke up with him a year prior (Max wanted to pry more about this but she didn't want to revisit - he understood), how Justin wanted kids and Juliet didn't, how the people of New York were even _more_ rude outside of Waverly Place, and worst of it all: how she had to _pay_ for Wi-Fi. Max was barely able to get a word in, but if he was being honest with himself he was relieved. He wasn't ready to share the full details of everything that had happened the past two years, everything that caused him to come back and show up unannounced.

They spent the entire day together, walking through the streets of New York and Central Park, and it was later in the evening when Alex gave Max a ride back to the sub-shop, that should be closing at this hour.

"By the way," Alex said, briefly glancing at him from the wheel. "Where's your Bonneville? You didn't sell it, did you?"

Max chuckled. "God no, that's my-"

"Pride and joy," Alex finished. "Yeah, I remember."

"It's in storage. I wasn't cleared to-" he paused. _Crap_.

"To what?" Alex inquired.

"Nothing. I wasn't cleared to…use it back at camp." Well, that was a half-truth. "So I put it in storage."

Alex hesitated. "If it's still there, does that mean…you're going to go back?"

Max sighed. "I don't know," he answered truthfully. The rest of the car ride was silent.

xXx

"We're back," Alex announced through the entrance of the shop, immediately going for the pickle jar. Max quietly followed behind and smiled at his sister's ways.

"Ah good," Jerry said. "If you're here you might as well help, Alex."

"Now wait a minute-" Alex tried to protest halfway through her pickle, but her father cut her off.

"You promised to fill in last weekend but you claimed that you had, what was it, dysania?"

"That's a real thing! And I do have it!" Alex exclaimed, oblivious to her mirroring her older brother not a while ago.

"You don't have chronic fatigue, Alex, you're just lazy."

At his daughter's surprised look, Jerry said, "That's right. We use the internet too."

"We even have Facebook profiles," Theresa added.

Even Max's eyebrows rose with his sister's.

This time Jerry felt insulted. He turned to his wife, "Why do our kids seem to think we're cave-people?"

"They also seem to think pagers didn't exist after the 90s so I wouldn't feel too bad," she replied.

"They're still a thing?" Alex said. "I thought they were just props in _Grey's Anatomy_."

Jerry shoves a cloth towards her. "Get to work."

Alex sighed, knowing she couldn't get out of this one. But lucky for her, it was a slow time at the sub-shop, the lunch rush had come and gone. If there was ever a time to do the least amount of work, it was now.

Theresa was in the back with the dishes, Jerry was behind the counter organising, Alex was wiping the tables clean and Max was putting napkins and condiments in the proper places.

"Alex, what are you doing?" Max leaned in close to his sister, yanking the rag out of her hand. "Look, like this, in a counter-clockwise motion. It gets the stains out easier."

Alex gave her a brother a teasing smirk. "Is that what they teach you in the Marines?"

In a high, squealing pitch, Max childishly mimicked her, "Is that what they teach you in the Marines?"

Alex shoved him playfully. "Hey, jerk, I don't sound like that."

"I'd beg to differ-" Max's shoulders hunched up towards his ears when he heard a resounding clang. A tower of pots and pans crashed onto the floor in the kitchen. Jerry quickly darted into the other room to help Theresa, who called out apologetically to her children, "Sorry!"

Max didn't hear her. For a few moments, his surroundings melted away and he was back in his fatigues, hearing gun blasts, watching men take cover around him. He couldn't just stand there, he needed to protect himself. The usual weight he felt balanced between both hands was absent. He reached for his back and panicked. Where was his AR-15?

"Max?" He jolted out of his thoughts. He glanced over to see his sister staring at him in disbelief. Slowly, Max lowered his hands, looking down at the floor and exhaling a shaky breath. It was just Alex. He was in the sub-shop. He was safe.

 _He was safe…he was safe…_ The more Max chanted it, the quicker his mind caught up to his surroundings. He continued with his task as if nothing had happened, though it was obvious from the way he kept looking down at his hands, that something was going through his mind.

Alex watched her little brother in surprise, his fingers still quivering as he picked up utensils on the table. She strode towards him and gently pried a fork away from his hands. "It's okay, I got it." Max tried to protest but Alex insisted and moved the utensil away from him. "Here," she gave him the rag. "Help me clean the tables."

After a moment, Max relented. They continued cleaning. Alex glanced at her brother in concern the whole evening, looking for any more noticeable shaking.

Maybe there was a different reason he came back other than to surprise them.

* * *

 **TBC**

* * *

 **AN:** Jesus, I hadn't meant for this chapter to turn into a 22-page monster but here you all are. As Alex would say, you're welcome. For those Justin lovers, fear not! He wasn't the main focus in this chapter but he will definitely be getting attention in future chapters, starting from the next one. Speaking of which, we'll be moving on to the next arc of the story soon.


	3. Max's Departure: Part III

**AN:** Here it is, the final part of this arc, then we're going to move on to the next part of the fic. Sorry it took me this long!

If you think the previous chapter was a long monster, you're in for a ride.

Special thanks to Nat, my Spanish beta-reader.

 **WARNING:** Mentions of gory images and cursing. Seriously guys, heed my words!

* * *

 **Max's Departure: Part III**

* * *

"Max, you got a letter," his mother said to him the minute he walked back into the apartment after his jog. It was nine o'clock on a quiet, Sunday morning. He took the letter and rushed upstairs to get ready for the day. His siblings had been planning a trip to Coney Island ever since he arrived a month ago. Luckily for Alex, Justin convinced management to lift the ban on their sister. He may have used a touch of magic, just for Max's sake because this was a special occasion.

Max yanked his earphones out and sat on his bed, opening the letter. He recognised the seal and felt his heart skip a beat.

The letter was from Andrew – one of the guys that had dragged him out of that wreckage several months ago. He'd sat by his bedside when he woke up and told him about what happened to the others. Since then, Max and Andrew had been inseparable. Max was hesitant to admit it but it had been difficult not being around his usual support system. A family was as good a support system as any but he doubted someone like Alex would understand about what happened. IEDs weren't underneath the sidewalks in downtown Manhattan.

Anyway, he had a strong suspicion that if he ended up revealing anything that was even the tiniest bit upsetting, he would get that horrible sympathetic look from his parents. He didn't want pity, he didn't deserve a damn thing. That was the whole point.

 _Hey Russo, how's NYC? How are those classic bagels you're always rhapsodising about? We're fine, here. Alberto 'fractured his kneecap' again but we all know that he's just trying to get out of doing anything…_

Max read on with a grin as Andrew went on in his letter, mentioning fellow privates, the new cafeteria menu and a gruelling ten-mile run that had left everyone exhausted. Closing his eyes, he could almost feel the sun on his back and hear the hearty laughs of his friends. He couldn't describe what he was experiencing at the moment, a mix between wanting to be running down the path with Drew again and staying here in Waverly, standing behind the register at the sub-station, joking around with Alex and wrestling with Justin.

Max shook his head with a gesture of finality. He needed to remember that he'd come home for a reason.

Quickly glancing at his watch, he placed the letter atop of his bed and headed into his bathroom to shower.

xXx

Alex walked through her parents' apartment door to find Justin already there and conversing with the family. She was grateful to see him clad in something other than that stupid robe and tie. Spotting an absence, she asked, "Where's Max?"

"Still getting ready," said her mother.

"Ugh, what was the point in waking up this early if he's not even ready?" Alex groaned, tempted to just crash onto the couch and sleep the rest of the day...or year.

"By the way, Alex," Justin began, "I don't want to have to mention again for you to be on your best behaviour. I'm not bailing you out of another ban."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," she brushed him off, not even thanking him, and ran up the stairs to get her less annoying brother - the one without a stick up his butt.

"Max?" She knocked on his bedroom door and found it was open. She walked in and flopped onto his bed, making her bounce slightly from the motion. Her attention then dropped towards a piece of paper beside her. It was a letter from his 'fellow bulldogs'. She shouldn't have been reading something private like this but when did Alex ever care about boundaries, especially when it came to her brothers?

The letter talked about how they wished for him to return soon (Alex pressed down the indignant anger rising in her chest - they just got him back!), and that they hoped he was coping (with what?), but what really caught her focus was the quote below a signature by some guy named Andrew. It said:

 _A mí la muerte me pela los dientes._

At first she wondered why it sounded so familiar, but then she recalled Max throwing up. At first she didn't think she heard him right, but now she knew for sure he was speaking Spanish.

"A mí la mu-erte me pela los dientes," Alex said aloud, as correctly as she could. She recognised some of the words - death and...teeth? That couldn't be right.

"What are you doing?" Alex jumped at the sound of Max's voice behind her. She turned around to find him with a towel over his bare shoulders, clad in jeans, angrily striding towards her and grabbing the letter from her hands.

"Max, I'm...sorry," Alex stuttered, surprised and a little nervous at his reaction. "I shouldn't have snooped. I didn't see anything." So she lied, that was hardly unusual Alex behaviour. "Please, don't be mad."

"What are you doing in my room?" he asked, in a tone she was only used to hearing from her older brother when he reprimanded her, definitely never from Max.

"I was just coming up to get you. I didn't know-I didn't-" For once, Alex couldn't find a way out of this one.

Max looked down. "Get out," he said in a low, sharp tenor that alarmed Alex.

"I'm sorry, Max," she apologised again. He turned his face away from her and Alex felt her heart constricting. "I'll let you get ready."

Alex couldn't feel herself walking down the stairs, her mind preoccupied with what just happened. She needed to remind herself that Max was not the same. He had grown into a man - a soldier. She couldn't treat him like she had in childhood, he deserved respect. It felt odd to realise it.

"Sweetie?" Alex looked up to find her family staring at her. Her mother continued, "Are you okay? You look like you've seen a ghost. You _didn't_ see a ghost, did you? Damn it, Jerry, I told you we needed to put a lock on that portal door!"

Alex shook her head. "Yeah - I mean - no, I didn't see a ghost. I'm…" _fine_? Was she? "Hey, Mom, what does mí...muerte...dientes mean?"

Theresa looked at her as if she developed two heads. " _Qué?_ "

"A...mí...muerte...something...dientes." They _all_ looked at her as if she developed two heads. Justin had a spoon of cereal hanging below his mouth.

"Mija," she placed a hand on top of her daughter's, "you're not making any sense."

"It's just some quote I heard and I was curious to know what it meant." Alex tried to recall the words again. "I think there was pelo in there somewhere, doesn't that mean hair?"

"A quote, huh?" Theresa began thinking. "A mí...muerte...diente...pelo?" She shook her head. "Wait, do you mean _pela_?"

"I don't know," Alex shrugged. "Maybe."

"Because what you might be thinking of is a Mexican proverb. _A mí la muerte me pela los dientes_."

Alex snapped her fingers. "That's it! What does it mean?"

"Well, honey, the literal translation is 'death peels my teeth'." At her daughter's horrified look, Theresa clarified, "but what it's supposed to mean is 'death can't do anything to me'."

Alex blinked, not sure if she felt better now that she got her answer. What did this mean for Max?

"Where did you hear it?" Justin piped in.

"Oh, uh, nowhere, just some telenovela." This earned her even stranger looks.

"Since when do you watch telenovelas?" her father asked, and thankfully before she anxiously searched her brain for an answer, Max appeared.

"Are we all ready?" he said. Alex didn't miss the way he avoided eye contact with her.

 _Way to go, Alex_ , she chastised herself. _You screwed it up. As always._

"Yeah," Justin answered, placing his bowl of unfinished cereal in the sink. "Let's go."

xXx

Alex, Justin and Max walked along the pier licking at ice cream cones when Justin suddenly glanced at his phone. "Aw, damn," he muttered. "Sorry guys, I gotta get to work."

"That's alright," Max smiled good-naturedly. "We've been here for hours."

"Yeah, speaking of work…" Alex searched her brain to come up with an excuse. "I…I need to go into the office and do a few things. Max, are you okay getting home by yourself?"

"Yeah," Max said, somewhat testily. He waved goodbye to his siblings with his ice cream cone in hand. "See you guys."

"Okay, I'll see you-" Alex tried to wave goodbye but he left in an instant. She winced at his cold brush-off.

As he walked away, Justin raised an eyebrow. "Okay, what's going on there?"

Alex sighed a shaky breath. "Actually, that's why I made an excuse about work. I just wanted to talk to you and didn't want Max to know."

"Wait – something's actually going on? He's not just mad that you stole his toothbrush to scrub a dirt spot off your shoe again?"

"That was one time!" Alex said in exasperation. "Listen, this is serious. I think something's going on with him."

"Alright," Justin placed a consoling hand on his sister's shoulder. "Let me get us to WizTech and we can talk there." He led them behind a cotton candy booth and with a twirl of his carefully-concealed wand, they were among their own kind in the Wizard World.

xXx

Theresa took out her empanadas, a specialty passed down to her by her grandmother, and placed them on the counter. Just then her youngest son walked through the front door and threw his keys on the table beside him. He took off his leather jacket and hung it on a hook.

"Mmm," Max said, walking over to his mother and reaching for a deliciously-golden empanada, "I missed that smell."

Theresa slapped his hand away. "Not yet, I just took them out. Do you want to get burned?"

Max involuntarily flinched. "What?"

"I said I just took them out," she repeated, unaware of his startled reaction. "Did you have fun with your brother and sister today?"

Max swallowed and shook his head. "Yeah," he said.

"Well spill, what did you guys do? Did you go on the Ferris Wheel? Have hot dogs? Ooh, did you play whack-a-mole? You used to love whack-a-mole!"

"Yeah, Mom." He opened the fridge door, suddenly feeling the need to distract himself.

"What's with the monosyllables? Justin didn't whack you with a foam hammer again, did he? Aye, that boy."

"No." He grabbed a beer and closed the refrigerator. He opened the bottle and looked up to see the astonished look on his mother's face. "What?" When tears suddenly started pooling in her eyes he quickly set the bottle down and approached her, placing two gentle hands on her arms. "Mom, what is it?"

"Nothing," she sobbed. "It's just...I missed it. I missed it all."

"What are you talking about?"

"You're all grown up and I missed it!" she cried again.

If his mother wasn't so upset he'd laugh at her dramatics. He pulled her in for a hug, his shirt absorbing her tears. "Mom, it's only been two years, not twenty."

"If feels like twenty!" He rubbed her back. "You're older and wiser and drnkgbdliiiiiight," she bawled into his shirt.

Max blinked. "What?"

Theresa pulled away and cupped his cheeks. "Where's my little boy?"

Alex didn't make him invisible, did she? "Still here, Mom."

"Physically maybe, but it feels like…" she dropped her hands, "you're so far away."

Max gulped sadly. He didn't know how to answer that. Instead he shook his head and with as much positivity as he could muster he said, "Well, I'm here now. What do you wanna do? Do you wanna-" he walked over to the sofa, knowing his father snuck some board games in the drawer underneath, "-play some monopoly? Or…watch _Die Hard_ together, like we used to every Christmas?" It wasn't Christmas yet, leaves were just starting to float in the air, but anything to stop his mother crying.

Theresa finally smiled. "How about we make some dinner?"

Max felt relieved; two years hadn't changed his habit of awkward fumbling when women cried around him. "Yeah, I could definitely go for that."

xXx

Alex strode along the corridor of WizTech beside Justin. She passed a few students, their arms laden with books and shook her head. "Some nerds never change," she muttered.

"What?" Justin asked, his back to her, unlocking his office door.

"Nothing!" Alex said with forced cheer. She followed her brother into his surprisingly expansive office, complete with a cherry-wood desk, tasteful paintings, and leather upholstered, wing-back chair. A shelf behind him boasted a few high school accomplishments and some WizTech plaques dated as recently as last year.

"Hm," Alex said appreciatively. "I like what you did with the office. I gotta say, Justin, I was beginning to think you lost out in the creative gene lottery."

Justin looked up from a memo on his desk with a start. "Oh, yeah," he said dismissively. "I think my assistant picked all this stuff out."

Alex sat down with a dissatisfied huff on the seat in front of his desk. "Figures," she said stonily. "Hang on, why didn't you ask me? I'm the one who sets up artwork for a living!"

"The last time I let you decorate my office you put _Harry Potter_ posters everywhere."

"Come on, how could I miss that opportunity?"

"You also put up sign-up sheets in the school halls for quidditch try-outs."

She snorted. "You have to admit, that was hi-larious."

"Yeah - so 'hi-larious' that _two-hundred people_ signed up, including teachers! I had to make a public announcement that quidditch _doesn't actually exist_."

Alex guffawed. "You mean to tell me that you didn't find that the least bit funny?"

"No!" he said huffily. "I got angry letters about it!"

"I can't believe I'm saying this but you're even less fun than you used to be."

"Alex, get to the point. What did you want to talk about?" Justin moved the paper off to the side.

Sobering up and feeling hesitant, Alex shifted in her seat, not sure how to explain what she had been seeing. She began fidgeting with her fingers. "How do I start this?" Clearing her throat, she continued, "Well, ever since Max came home, he's been acting…different. I knew he wouldn't be the same after the Marines and everything, but…"

Justin nodded, imploring her to continue.

"Sometimes he gets up and runs out of the room randomly," Alex explained, "and that day you came over for breakfast, when he said he was going upstairs to shower, he lied. He threw up."

"What?" Justin asked, leaning in closer.

"Yeah." Alex nodded, all the issues she had countered rushing into her mind. "He gets really startled by sudden noises too. A few weeks ago, Mom dropped something in the kitchen and Max got really…weird. It was like he was just…gone. Then his hands got all shaky.

"And today, the reason he's been acting so short with me was because he caught me reading a letter in his room."

"You went snooping in his room?"

"Of course I went snooping in his room, how long have you known me? But that isn't the point. Justin, you should've seen the look on his face." She swallowed. "I couldn't recognise him."

Justin looked at her with worry. Alex had rarely shown seriousness in a lot of things. She usually just floated through life as if she was riding their family's old flying carpet. So it was concerning because if it bothered his sister of all people, then it definitely bothered him.

"Whoever it was that came back," Alex said, "it's not Max. That's not our little brother."

"And what? You think it's magic-related?" Justin pitched in.

Alex got up to pace, running her hands through her hair. "I don't know, maybe…"

Justin drew back, a look of realisation dawning on his face. "Alex…" he said slowly. "Think about it. What do all of those symptoms sound like to you? Startled by sudden noises? Anxiety? Evasiveness?"

Alex put her head in her hands. "I don't know, Justin! I've never…" she paused, focusing on a pattern in the carpeted floor. "Oh my God." She suddenly gulped.

"It's not magic, Alex," Justin nodded, knowing that his sister had understood. "It's trauma." He rubbed his eyes, letting brutal truth sink in for himself. "Whatever happened to him, he's reliving it over and over in his mind." Justin then added quietly, "He needs help."

Alex recalled the letter, the word _cope_ falling into place. "But what are we supposed to do?" She sat back onto her seat, suddenly feeling the need to be closer to her brother. Justin had answers, he always made it better. "He never wants to talk about it. He got so angry the other day when…" her voice trailed off.

"Wait."

"What?"

"The quote."

"What quote?"

"You know, the one Mom translated for me?"

"The one you supposedly got from a telenovela?"

"That's just it, Justin. I read it from the letter."

"Okay?"

"But that's not the weirdest part. I heard that quote from Max when I was helping him after he hurled."

"Max doesn't speak Spanish."

"He also doesn't hide things from us, lie about throwing up and treat me like-" she stopped, feeling herself getting upset again. "We need to get Max to open up."

"How do you suppose we do that?"

"I don't know! Maybe we can sit him down, and if he tries to escape we can use a spell to keep him seated."

"Oh, that's a brilliant idea. Let's force a soldier with serious post-traumatic stress to relive all the most horrible things he has seen probably in his entire life."

"And this is why you're the one who comes up with the plans. I'm open to suggestions."

"Alex," he leaned in, making sure to hold her attention, "this is beyond our control. Much as we want to, we're probably not the best people to help him."

Alex broke eye contact.

"I know," he placed a gentle hand on her crossed arms on the table, "this is hard on me too."

xXx

"Mom, the bagels in here are mouldy," Max complained after rooting through the refrigerator for fresh vegetables.

"Your father," Theresa shook her head with dismay. "Well - throw them out!"

Max's nose wrinkled in disgust. "Ugh, gross," he said as he threw them in the bin.

Theresa pulled out a cutting board and began to chop away at a tomato. She turned to her son with an incredulous look. "Are you telling me that you've been off in the Marines doing and seeing God knows what and a little mould can still bother you? You used to try and grow your _own_ mould!"

"That was before I had to scrub it off the walls of my barrack. You have no idea how long it took."

Theresa raised an eyebrow. "Oh I have some idea." She hands him the knife. "Here, cut these vegetables."

"What are we making here anyway?" Max asked, slicing a green pepper.

"Chicken stir fry. A lot of it."

"Why so much?"

"It's family dinner night." At her son's confused look, she said, "Oh that's right. See, after you left, the family - mostly I - wanted...well, I didn't want to feel like I was losing anyone else. So every once a month, I force everyone to clear their schedules and have dinner here. Your father, me, Justin and Juliet, Harper, Alex and Mason...well before they broke up."

"Yeah, I heard about that."

"She was a mess at the time. It took a lot of strength...and cookie dough, but she got through it."

Max remembered this morning and felt guilty for snapping at his sister. "She doesn't really talk about it."

"Well, honey, I don't think she wants to relive it. She just wants to put it behind her."

He paused, then said under his breath, "Yeah, I get that."

"Sorry?"

"Nothing. Are we adding anything else?"

"No, that's about it - actually, more red peppers. Justin loves them."

Max did as he was told. "Hey - what about Zeke? Wasn't he dating Harper before I left?"

"Harper didn't tell you?"

"Harper barely has the time to breathe, let alone spend ten minutes to catch me up."

"They broke up not long after you were gone. Zeke was riding on Harper about spending too much time at her job."

Max felt annoyed and slightly protective. "That's not her fault."

Theresa shrugged. "What can you do?" She opened the drawer and took out a lighter. Tilting the knob, she clicked the lighter and the hob immediately caught fire.

" _GET BACK!"_

Max jumped at the sudden appearance of the raging blaze.

 _The heat pierced his skin._

He dropped the knife from his hands with a _clang_.

 _Searing pain. Screaming._

Startled, Theresa looked at her son and found an expression of terror on his face.

He remembered. _It was him who was screaming._

Max's throat started to close. He couldn't breathe. _He couldn't breathe._

Before Theresa could ask anything, he turned the opposite direction and hurried up the stairs. She turned off the cooker and followed him. "Max?"

He threw himself into bathroom and slammed the door behind, blocking his mother from entering.

"Max?!" She banged at the door and called out to him, but it was pointless. His mind was far gone.

Max leaned back against the door. He couldn't hear anything over the sound of his thumping heart and unwavering breaths. He looked down at his shaking hands, chastising himself for not being able to get a grip. He started to sway from hyperventilation and his vision was blurring slightly from the dizziness. Max moved away from the door and hoped some pacing would help, unaware that it was now his father who was on the other side of the door asking him if he could come in.

"A mí la muerte...me pela los dientes...a mí...la muerte...me pela...los...los..." he tried to reiterate, but his body was not responding.

" _GET BACK!" he tried to warn them. He fucking tried. Everything happened too quickly. He was in the air, and then he woke up in the ground with an intense smell of copper and charcoal surrounding him._

 _Then his mind registered the pain._

At the sound of screaming Jerry immediately swung the door open and found his son sitting on the floor, his back against the bathtub. He pulled aggressively at his short hair and struggled to breathe.

Jerry kneeled to the ground and grabbed his wrists, pulling them away from his head. "Max, look at me." His son fought against him, fists clenched firmly. " _Look at me!_ " He fought harder, but that only made Jerry hold him tighter. "Snap out of it!"

Max broke through his reverie and looked up at the voice, noticing his father's presence for the first time.

Jerry felt his heart split like crushed ice. "It's okay," he reassured, his thumbs caressing the back of Max's hands. "You're okay."

Max's breathing steadied, and slowly, he unclenched his fists.

xXx

"So what do we do?" Alex asked Justin. They stood outside their front door, figuring out a strategy as to how to get their brother the help he needed without being too direct.

Justin rubbed at his jaw and then stated, "I think I have something. Follow my lead."

They walked through their front door and any strategies they had been planning had been thrown out the window by the look on their parents' faces, both stood whispering to each other in an anxious manner.

"What's going on?" Justin asked, worriedly.

Jerry and Theresa looked at each other, unsure what to say. "It's Max," Theresa finally said.

"What about him?" Alex immediately walked up to them. "Is he okay?"

Jerry said, "No. He absolutely is not okay."

"What do you mean? What happened?"

"He…" he shook his head. "I don't even know. One minute he was cooking with your mom, the next he was screaming!"

Justin looked at his sister, then back at his dad. "Screaming?"

"Something is wrong with him," Theresa said. "I saw the look on his face. He looked terrified."

"What were you doing before?" Justin asked, trying to get to the bottom of the trauma.

"Nothing, just talking and cooking stir fry for tonight."

"What's going on?" They all turned at the sound of Max's voice. He walked down the stairs, face passive and casual-mannered, and entered the kitchen. He hardly looked like a man who was on the verge of a mental breakdown a few minutes ago.

Alex approached Max steadily, as if he were a timid animal ready to run the opposite direction at any sudden movements.

Justin turned to his parents and whispered, "Let us take care of this. We won't get much out of him if we all hounded him at the same time."

Nodding, Theresa grabbed a reluctant Jerry and proclaimed, "We're heading to the grocery store for some tortilla wraps."

Max didn't say anything as he continued to fumble around the kitchen, whether he was ignoring them or didn't hear they weren't too sure.

"So," Alex started, but Max cut her off.

"Hey listen, Alex, I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for snapping at you this morning."

Alex blinked, recalling the incident. "Oh, don't worry about it."

"Really," Max persisted, "I shouldn't have reacted the way I did. And you didn't deserve the way I treated you today."

Alex looked at Justin, who stood warily with his arms crossed. "Well, if you're really sorry then maybe you could make it up to me…"

"Sure, anything."

"Alex-" Justin warned, but she shushed him with a wave of a hand.

"I want you to tell me about your adventures."

"What adventures?"

"You know, your time as a badass Marine."

Max's face dropped the slightest. "Why do you wanna know about that?"

"Why wouldn't I want to know? It's where you've been the last few years and we all missed you."

"And then I came back. Why revisit the past?"

"To reminisce," she shrugged casually. "Come to think of it, you don't ever talk about what happened these past two years."

"There's not much to say," he countered, his face getting darker by the second.

"If there's not much to say, why are you getting so defensive?"

"I'm not getting defensive."

"So why don't you just tell me what happened?"

"I don't wanna talk about it."

"Max, you can tell me-"

" _I said I don't want to talk about it!_ "

Alex and Justin flinched at the echo of their brother's yell, reverberating throughout the room.

Max, despite his anger, felt remorse flicker within him at the sight of Alex's recoiled reaction. He looked at his brother instead, which honestly didn't make him feel any better. Justin looked as if he didn't know him.

Max turned his head away and made a beeline for the stairs.

"No, wait," Alex took a hold of his tattooed arm and pulled him back.

The surprise contact forced Max to turn and pull his arm away. This time, he recognised the stares they were giving him - pity.

"Please, Max?" Alex said softly.

Max's mouth opened and closed, hesitant. He supposed this was what he had been trying to avoid. If he couldn't even get through the night without remembering all that had happened, how was he supposed to relay the memories to someone else? The regret from the day of the explosion already sat heavily in his stomach and he couldn't bear to pass that off onto his siblings, whose eyes were shining now at him.

Alex's heart dropped in disappointment when Max turned away. Slowly, he walked towards the door of the apartment but stopped before his hand could enclose around the handle.

Alex watched him from her position by the staircase, knowing that it would be of no use to stop his departure.

Instead, Max began to speak.

"Despite what you think, it wasn't actually easy for me to leave," he said, uncertain. "I wasn't really sure why I decided to go into the military. Maybe it was because I felt like I didn't belong at home anymore…" He walked up to his siblings and looked up at Alex, who was shaking her head as if to negate the statement.

"It's true," Max insisted, now leaning against the back of the couch and crossing his arms in rebuttal. "Everyone had something. Alex, you had your art and Justin, you were already super successful and I knew that I could never…" he exhaled. "I could never measure up to something like that."

"No, Max," Justin interjects, shaking his head. "You know that's not true."

"Don't I?" Max challenged, a dangerous glint to his eye. "All I heard from you guys when I was growing up was how different I was from you two."

"And that's a bad thing?" Alex asked.

"It wasn't a good thing!" Max said angrily. "But we're not talking about that." He uncrossed his arms. "You wanna know what happened? Hm?"

The sudden change in Max's demeanour urged Alex to take a step backward, but she stood her ground, determined to hear her little brother out. She takes comfort in Justin echoing her determination by striding closer.

"You were right about one thing, Alex. I didn't really know what I was doing…"

xXx

 _Two years prior - Bootcamp_

Max stepped off the bus, shielding his eyes from the sun. A line of both men and women was forming outside of a large, concrete building. A man in uniform directed him to the line closest to the building. He stood behind a man that looked no older than himself. After a few minutes, however, it felt like the sun had seeped through his t-shirt and into his skin. Fidgeting, he glanced around at the others, who all appeared to be staring straight ahead.

When it seemed like no one was looking, Max slipped his cell phone out of his pocket and aimlessly scrolled through the various photos he had taken during his travels prior, grinning at his conversations with Alex and feeling disheartened at the silent end of Justin's.

He wasn't sure what the proper etiquette was here, was he supposed to just stand there silently? Was this already a test of some sort? If so, he knew that this was going to be a difficult few months.

Max became so absorbed looking through Instagram photos that he didn't even hear an older man asking, "Russo? Russo?!" Then, finally, "RUSSO!"

Max's head snapped upwards. "Huh?" he looked at the man in front of him and then smirked.

The man standing before him was Corporal Thrasher, who had lead the JROTC discussion when Max had been in high school. He had not been amused by Max's flippant questions such as, "Where do you pee if you have to go during a run?" and "Can I see your dog-tags?"

Evidently, Corporal Thrasher did not exude the same eagerness to see a familiar face. "Not you," he groaned seeing Max.

"Oh, please Corporal, don't sound too excited for my sake," Max grinned, then stage-whispered, "You don't want the rest of the team here thinking you played favourites."

The Corporal reached down and plucked Max's phone out of his hands and slipped it into his own pocket. "You will get this back when you _wipe that moronic grin off your Goddamn face_!" he yelled, spittle flying onto Max's cheeks.

Max reached up and wiped it off, unbothered by the man's animalistic scowl. "You really need a moronic smile of your own, Corporal."

If possible, Thrasher scowled even more. " _Drop down and give me fifty, Private!_ " he screamed.

Max shrugged, unaffected by the number. "No problem."

"Did I say fifty?" Thrasher smiled spitefully. "I meant a hundred."

With stubborn Russo blood running through his veins, Max didn't allow the Corporal's attitude to break his spirit and got down on the ground, mentally counting his push-ups.

"As for the rest of you, ten-hut! I am Corporal Richard Thrasher, and you will be training-"

"Wait a minute," Max interrupted, sitting back on his heels and ignoring the reddening of his corporal's face. "Richard Thrasher?" He looked at everyone else's faces and noticing their wide-eyed expressions silently screaming at him not to say anything further. "You mean to tell me that your name...is Dick Thrasher?"

Everyone shook their heads, some of them containing their snorts.

 _Present day_

"You didn't, Max," Justin rubbed his forehead.

Alex chuckled, amused and proud of her brother's antics. "What did the Corporal do?"

"Let's just say the stench of the latrines followed me till the end of my training."

Alex and Justin scrunched up their noses.

 _One year prior…._

Once the long, gruelling process of basic training came to an end, Max had to move on to the School of Infantry. Just like Alex had feared, Max was placed in MCT - Marine Combat Training.

Initially, Max had recoiled at the thought of even _holding_ a gun in his hands but he had enlisted in the Marines for a reason and it couldn't be _that_ different from holding a wand now, could it? He had to admit, it gave him a sense of pride. It also didn't hurt that Corporal Thrasher had to give Max grudging respect after he completed the Manoeuvre Under Fire procedure in two minutes and forty seconds, well within the guidelines.

"Alright, Private, don't let it get to your head," Thrasher had said before striding away. Max hadn't been able to contain his glee, he'd first-bumped the air and then went back to cheering on the rest of his team.

During basic, Max had ended up scrubbing the latrine floors with his own toothbrush for once again agitating Corporal Thrasher. He had only managed to make two squares of tile shine before another Private walked into the room, sunk to his knees and produced his own toothbrush.

Max smiled at the other man, thinking that whoever this was, they surely must have pissed off Corporal Thrasher pretty bad to end up there. He tended to reserve the worst punishments for Max.

"I know," the guy said, noticing Max's amused expression. "I messed up."

"Bad enough to be using your own damn toothbrush to scrub the floor?" Max asked, one eyebrow raised.

"Nah," the Private smirked. "I swiped my roommate's."

Max laughed out loud and extended his hand. "Max Russo. I'm from New York."

"Robert Hendricks. Boston."

"Huh, I know some people from Boston." Max reared back, regarding the young man. "Celtics fan?"

Robert nodded, slowly. "They may never win the championship again…." he said wistfully.

Max laughed and bent down to work on the square he'd been scrubbing when Robert walked in. "There's always hope," he said easily.

After that, the two spent most of their available time together. They received the same punishment so often that eventually, Corporal Thrasher split them up because they had 'too much fun' doing what was supposed to be gruelling and embarrassing work.

Once, while eating in the mess hall, Max attempted to flick a pea into Robert's face but it sailed over the table and onto a man nearby. He rose, intimidating, but then reached for the fallen pea and tossed it easily back onto Max's tray. "You need to work on your target shooting," he reprimanded. His name was Private Joshua Hein, a Terry Crews look-alike, an excellent sharpshooter and, eventually, the third member of their 'gang'.

Josh did not get in nearly as much trouble as Max or even Robert. His serious demeanour helped him significantly. In the face of a screaming corporal or sergeant, his expression never wavered. Max and Joshua were not so lucky; Max had a nervous habit of laughing while being scolded and Joshua was susceptible to laughing when another person was.

Their arms eventually became well-defined after the many push-ups they were ordered to do in the most random of places: roll call, the dark, swampy forest during nightly patrol and, yes, the latrines. Once, Max had made yet another interminable joke about 'Dick Thrasher' and did two hundred push-ups. To his chagrin, Corporal Thrasher thought that the sweat from Max's palms had made the floor dirty and he spent his free hour cleaning the places where his hands had been, over and over.

The third friend Max made in the twenty-nine days spent doing MCT was Hilda Rodriguez. She had a volatile personality and was often challenging men in push-up and pull-up contests to prove that women were just as powerful. She mumbled curses under her breath perpetually. It amused Max greatly because she always swore in Spanish and, despite Theresa's admonitions, he had never learned the language growing up.

It was not until a dangerous situation on base that the two crossed paths.

Max and Hilda had each been practising their target shooting. Hilda had been on the far side of the unit, nearby an active corporal.

Unbeknownst to the young privates, Corporal Collier had been harbouring some resentment towards his supervising officer, also at the range, for some time. He had been passed on for promotion three times now and hadn't been able to forgive the older man for recently accepting a position that should have been his. It was that morning that his anger seemed to come to a head.

Just as Max levelled his sights on the target and exhaled a steady breath to focus, a loud bang went off. That was normal, they were at the shooting range after all.

However, Max's insides seized when he heard the pained shout of the supervising officer that had been standing next to Hilda, helping her with gun positioning. The officer laid down on the ground, clutching at his arm. His own gun had fallen out of his grasp when he fell and his hand outstretched across the dirt, reaching.

Corporal Collier kicked the gun away with his boot and then swivelled, his sight now on Hilda.

"Step away from your gun or I'm putting a fucking bullet in your brain," he demanded. When Hilda hesitated, his finger quivered against the trigger.

Instinctively, Max, twelve feet away, grabbed his gun and brought it to his shoulder. He shot Corporal Collier in the arm and leg, successfully rendering him incapable of doing anything else.

It had been a largely important moment in Max's career as a Marine. Seeing Hilda standing in surprise, he had felt the urge to protect one of his own. He didn't understand what the Corporal had been expecting. They were, after all, at the shooting range and everyone was armed. Perhaps it had been his intention to die but Max hadn't given him the satisfaction, the Corporal lived and went on to be formally charged for the incident.

The strongest memory of that moment was the solid feel of the AR-15 in his hands, the way that every noise around him dulled to a low hum and the confidence he instilled within himself before he took down the Corporal. It was his first experience shooting the gun in a 'real' situation and, much like during his fitness test, Corporal Thrasher later on gave Max a sort-of compliment, "Alright Private, maybe you _don't_ have terrible aim."

Of course, the most memorable part of that experience was the way Hilda had rounded on him when other supervising officers ran up to the scene. "I didn't need you to do that," she insisted. _"No nací para ser un débil."_

That night, Max met up with Hilda and asked her what she had said. It became her mission to "teach a fellow Hispanic the language of his world". It became a thorn in Robert and Joshua's side, Max and Hilda would have entire conversations in Spanish before realising that their friends had been sitting there. Joshua would lament often that their friend group needed a translator.

Only a week before MCT was over, Farah Solomon was getting screamed at by Corporal Thrasher for having been late to roll call. The Corporal had evidently been in a terrible mood, he was persistent in his scolding - so much so, that Max and Joshua created a diversion of a 'fight' so that the Corporal would leave Farah alone.

After that exchange, Farah expressed her gratitude and the group of four became five.

No one was surprised when all five of them were chosen to deploy to Afghanistan.

Max, looking down at the paper in his hand, had turned to Hilda and said, " _Al menos me voy a Afganistán contigo. ¿Te imaginas lo que harías en el maldito lugar solo?"_

Hilda snorted. " _Creo que soy yo quien te mantiene a raya_."

"Help? Please?" Joshua asked, turning to Farah, who had taken Spanish in college.

Farah shrugged. "It's the same old shit. Max thinks that Hilda will burn the whole damn world down and Hilda pretends like she doesn't want Max there alongside her when it happens."

"They said all that?" Robert asked incredulously.

"Paraphrasing, of course," Farah smirked. After only a week with the foursome, she was able to pick up on their regular habits and attitudes. It was also no secret that Hilda had a crazy temper and Max was often under her wrath for verbally sparring with her.

"At least he picked it up finally," Hilda lamented. "How is it possible that someone who's Mexican didn't learn Spanish?"

"Half-Mexican," Max corrected with his forefinger. "I'm also half-Italian and you don't hear me speaking that either."

"Ugh!" Hilda shook her head. "As if that language compares!"

Once they reached their destination they met Patrick Thomas, a medic that helped put back together Robert's pinkie after Max dared him to jump from one boulder to another. The rest of the gang warned him it was too far, but there was no stopping those two when they were trying to one-up one another.

Robert claimed he hurt his hand trying to pull a starving puppy out of some nearby wreckage.

"We're in the middle of the desert," Patrick had said, sceptically.

"I meant a dog...a very old, starving dog," Robert replied. "With one leg," he added for effect.

Patrick raised his eyebrow. "Mm hm." He finished wrapping the finger. "Well I love dogs, have one waiting for me back home."

Robert lifted himself off the bed, smiling. "A dog person, huh? Me too..."

That night Robert hadn't realised how much he was talking about Patrick until Max told him to shut up and go to bed because it was _four in the fucking morning_.

By the time breakfast rolled around Max had insisted Patrick join them, and as payback for Robert keeping him awake all night he proceeded to tell Patrick all about Robert's adventures in basic training, like the time the Drill Sergeant told Robert to beat his face, not knowing that it meant press-ups, and prompted to punch himself in the face so hard he fell to the ground. Max earned himself a nasty bruise from being kicked under the table by the star of the story.

Robert got his payback a few months later by finding a picture of Max when he was younger and showing it to the rest of the team. The picture had depicted Max standing behind a chair that occupied his sister and his older brother sitting beside her, his hands on both their shoulders. It was taken by their mother at a family dinner celebrating Justin's latest nerd award.

Max walked in on Hilda teasingly calling him, "Foetus Maximus."

"Actually," Max interrupted, catching everyone off-guard, "it's short for Maximilian." He walked over to the picture, Hilda handing it over.

"Are those your older siblings?" she asked in a surprisingly tender manner.

"Yeah," he smiled fondly, staring down at the photo.

"You must miss them a lot," she said, placing an arm on his shoulder.

Max didn't have a chance to respond before the supervising officer was yelling orders to gather their weapons.

Hilda turned away to gather up her gear and, quickly, Max tucked the photo within the forefront of his helmet before placing it firmly on his head.

That was the last thing Max remembered before he woke up on the ground, a foul stench he did not recognise filling his nostrils. He felt as if his skin was scorching and, to his horror, after glancing down at his hand, he realised it was burnt beyond recognition. He turned his head to the side, unaware that a thin layer of skin is already weaving back along his jawline. The sight beyond the flames felt as if it would be forever trapped into his retinas, a horror story without an end.

A shift of his eyes revealed an outstretched hand, as if it were reaching toward him but as Max's sight lifted upwards, he realised the hand was not attached to its owner. Even laying in his position, he felt bile rising in his throat. The vision of what was before him could not be denied; his comrades, his friends, lay before him in varying degrees of disarray.

Limbs were scattered around him - an arm here, a leg there. What body part belonged to which Marine was unclear. The uncertainty of the scene was too much to bear witness to but closing his eyes did nothing to prevent the images from appearing.

His ears didn't register a sound, the explosion had numbed his hearing. He did not hear himself scream and cry out in pain and grief, nor he did hear a medic approaching him and calling out, "This one's still alive!" and his partner's incredulous response, "How is that possible?"

The shock had consumed him entirely by the time he was in the Air Evac and heading back to the city.

It was not until he woke up at the hospital, Corporal Thrasher's palms resting against his shoulders and keeping him moored to the hospital bed, that he understood what had happened.

 _They had been surveying the area, joking about the lunch break that was soon to happen. Robert and Patrick, leading the group, were lightheartedly bickering._

" _You better not eat that mac 'n' cheese tonight," Robert warned his friend. "Last time you complained all night that you had stomach cramps."_

" _I'm not lactose intolerant!" Patrick insisted. "I'm lactose...sensitive."_

" _That's not a thing and you should know that," Robert teased the young medic._

 _Patrick pouted. "Why don't you ever just let me be right?"_

 _Robert chuckled and stopped to wipe the sweat from his forehead as Patrick walked ahead of him. "You know you love me!" he shouted after the Marine._

 _Suddenly, Robert stopped, eyes blown wide in panic at what he saw before him on the ground._

 _Patrick, looking up, realised that Robert had just stepped on an IED. "Robert!" he shouted, running ahead to pull his friend away before any damage could be done._

" _GET BACK!" Max ordered, but it was too late. All three men were thrown back from the reverberating blast, killed instantly. Farah and Hilda, right behind, were lost in a haze of debris and dirt._

 _Max, at the helm of the group, knocked his head against a rock after being propelled backwards by the blast. His helmet fell further away with the photo inside remaining intact. He, along with the others, had died immediately._

 _Except that Max had not died. For all intents and purposes, he was supposed to have been killed along with his fellow soldiers. However, the pendant Alex had given him began to emit a faint glow beneath his fatigues. It grew brighter until it practically eclipsed his body. A golden hue traced along his head and neck, closing and healing the wound on the back of his head that had been his demise._

 _His heart once again began to beat._

 _Max's eyes opened with a gasp and was met with the smoke and wreckage that had been his team._

"Russo!"

Max bolted upright in his bed, hissing at the pain this caused in his arms. "God damn it," he whispered, tears pricking at his eyes.

"You're going to be okay," Corporal Thrasher said, hand gently pushing down at the Private's torso, careful as to not aggravate the wrapped wounds. "Hey. Russo."

Max finally looked up, bewildered at the sight of the Corporal. "Where the hell am I?" he asked, voice rough with disuse.

"San Diego," Thrasher said softly. "We had to get you out of there as soon as we could."

Max nodded, leaning back against his pillow tenderly. Finally, he turned his head, locking eyes with the Corporal. "The...others. Where?"

Corporal Thrasher looked hesitant. "Ah, Russo...we don't need to…"

" _Tell me_ ," Max demanded, voice low.

Thrasher nodded once, then revealed, "Their bodies...they've been sent home to their families."

Max didn't realise the tears that were slowly dripping down, his nerve damage was still reversing itself.

"Now listen here, soldier," Thrasher leaned close in his seat toward the young Private. "You're going to pull through this, you hear me? You are a damn strong Marine."

Max nodded, wordless.

Spending weeks prone in his bed, Max only had more time to ruminate over what had happened. Some nights were worse than others. He'd wake up screaming in pain and anguish, his body thrashing violently and only subdued by medication. It was not until Andrew, a young corporal that helped to pull him out of the wreckage, came by to wish Max well that he began to feel somewhat eager to speak with someone else. Most days, Andrew sat beside Max and kept him company, his approachable nature allowing Max to open up about the friends he had lost and what they taught him every day.

Several weeks passed before the gauze around his face was ready to be unwrapped. He didn't hear when the doctors continuously rattled on about their astonishment at his miraculous recovery. He didn't register his corporal and Andrew insisting how well his face was holding up. All he could focus on, all he could see in the small mirror that was handed to him by the nurse, was how he couldn't recognise the man staring back at him. Torn, mangled, scaly...as if candlewax permanently resided there.

 _Present_

"Sometimes I still see that face staring back at me..."

Justin and Alex stood their motionless, speechless. Of all the scenarios they had had in mind, nothing compared to the loss that their little brother suffered.

Finally, Justin strode towards Max, a hand rising up and squeezing his shoulder.

Max cleared his throat. "Somehow...my face healed. I managed to walk away without a single scar." He shook his head, scornfully laughing in disbelief. "How does that... _happen_? How does someone walk away from that with nothing to show for it? How did I-" Max felt his throat constrict. He bowed his head in defeat, unable to control the tenor in his voice any longer. "I just don't understand...How did I survive?" His tears fell freely by his feet. " _Why_ did I survive?"

Unaware ahead of him, a look of shock and realisation passed Alex's eyes as she gripped her necklace. Max suddenly made a beeline towards the balcony, desperate for air, ignoring Justin's calls out to him.

Not knowing how to help him, Justin turned to Alex but stopped when he saw the look on her face.

"What?" he asked.

Alex briefly contemplated telling him the truth, then slowly she said, "I know why Max survived that day."

Justin furrowed his eyebrows, awaiting her answer.

"It's because of this," lifting up the family heirloom, she averted his eyes towards the object.

"The necklace Mom gave you? What does that have to do with anything?"

"I didn't just give it to Max for sentimental value, Justin. I charmed it." Alex started pacing. "Max was taking off to do God knows what and I was scared, okay? So I used the only thing I relied on all these years. I took the necklace and…"

The clues fell into place in Justin's mind. "Put a protection spell on it," he finished.

"You did what?" Alex whipped her head round to find Max back in the room, a look of shock on his face.

"Max-" Alex started, but was immediately cut off.

"You used magic on me?" Max accused, unsure whether he was mad that she used magic or that she didn't tell him. He considered striding towards her, but instead chose to remain in his spot by the doors of the balcony.

"I didn't know what else to do! You were leaving and I had to think fast."

Max gritted his teeth, "You had no right-"

"She saved your life, Max," Justin said, finding himself in an unfamiliar position of defending Alex's actions. "You wouldn't be here if it weren't for her."

"Exactly. While everyone else gets taken by that fucking bomb, I come back home without a scratch!" his voice rose.

"Take it easy," Justin said, in attempt to placate his brother's growing anger.

Max ignored him. "Do you have any idea what it was like? In a room full of grieving families, how unbearable it was looking at those faces and just unable to give them any answers? To explain how I miraculously survived while their sons and daughters died? How is that fair?"

"Max-" Alex tried.

"It's not fair, Max. You're right. But you shouldn't be taking it out on Alex. You should be thanking her for keeping you alive!"

Max eyes whirled towards his sister. "Yes, Alex. Thank you for letting _me_ live and _everyone else_ die. Thank you for the night terrors, the panic attacks and every aftermath that followed this hell."

Alex unconsciously took a few small steps backwards as Max's ferocious yelling reverberated the room. She reassured herself that he was just upset, he didn't mean to be so angry at her. He just needed something to blame and if she had to be the fall guy in order for Max to start healing, then that was a sacrifice she was willing to make. But it was hard. She had never seen that look on his face before, a look so cold directed at _her_. She hadn't felt fear of losing one of her brothers since their pact to stay close even after the Wizard Competition, but it was starting to feel like that pact was going to break.

There was a tense silence between them. Then Max said, "I should be buried with them."

Tearful and shocked, Alex strode towards him and made a move to hold onto his arms, but he moved away from her. She flinched at his callous reaction.

Max then grabbed his coat, ignoring Alex's calls out to him, and headed out the door, slamming it behind him.

Justin walked towards Alex and rubbed her shoulders in comfort. "Hey, it's okay."

"My brother hates me, give me a minute to bask in the ecstasy."

"He doesn't hate you. Hey, look at me," his hold on Alex tightened to prevent her from turning away. "He's suffering and you helped to ease it a little more by getting him to open up."

"Ease it? He wished he was dead."

"That's just his guilt talking. This is what I meant when I said it's beyond our control. He needs to talk to someone who is qualified to deal with problems like this." As always, Justin had the good head on his shoulders and used logic to help him break down a situation. Although this time, Alex suspected he was relying on logic for more than he was willing to admit.

She paused. "Did I really do the right thing, Justin? Or was I being selfish? That's it, isn't it? I was being selfish, as always. Typical Alex. Well, I'm sorry, okay? I'm sorry I'm always thinking of myself-"

Justin hushed her and pulled her in for a hug. "You kept him alive. Don't ever be sorry." He felt his sister nod her head against his shoulder. "And maybe a part of you was being selfish, and if that's the case, I'm selfish too."

"Really?"

"Yeah, because I would've done the same thing."

Alex felt her shoulders relax. Justin was right, he always was. But so was Max. The truth made itself at home between her guilt and actions, she felt awful for what happened, but she wasn't sorry for saving Max.

* * *

 **TBC**

* * *

 **AN:** You have no idea how long it took me to write that last. bloody. paragraph.

Anyway, the conversation between Justin and Alex in WizTech happens _while_ Max has a panic attack, and it was inspired by the second half of the song "Take It All Away" by RED, (i.e. time 3:08). Can you imagine how awesome of a scene this would be on Television? I can just imagine the camera cuts between the conversation and Max's breaking point and the song builds up intensely.

Also, I just wanted to explain Theresa's sudden burst of tears when Max grabbed a beer. Seeing her son drink an adult's drink just reminded her that she had missed out the point where he became old enough. It hit her that her youngest child is no longer a child.

So yeah, I know this chapter was pretty heavy, (believe me, it hurt me much more than it hurt you), but I hope you enjoyed it nonetheless, and as always I would appreciate any feedback.

Stay tuned for part four!

P.S. If you're still wondering, the photo of Max and his siblings described in this chapter refers to the cover image of the fanfic.


	4. The Prophecy

**AN:** This part was inspired by my all-time favourite show...cookies to anyone who guesses it.

Thank you **Kris68** for your kind words! I would've replied but you're signed on as a guest.

 **Warning:** At this point just assume cursing is now thing in the story.

* * *

 **The Prophecy**

* * *

Theresa and Jerry were talking in the shop's kitchen when they heard footsteps coming down the spiral staircase. They walked out in time to see their youngest angrily striding towards the entrance.

"Max?" Theresa called out, only to receive a door slam in response. She and Jerry recoiled slightly from the noise and exchanged a worried look before hurrying to their apartment.

They walked in to find Justin comforting Alex.

"What happened?" Jerry asked, his concern showing.

The siblings separated and Alex immediately wiped any remnants of tears from her face and composed herself.

"Honestly, Dad," Justin said, "we don't even know where to begin. It's...it's pretty bad."

Afraid she was losing her family again, Theresa proposed, "Whatever it is I'm sure we can fix it. Just tell us what happened. Why was Max storming out?"

Alex briefly contemplated between telling them the story herself or leaving it for Max to open up about it when he was ready. She figured it was hard enough for him to tell her and Justin and probably wasn't up to updating anyone else anytime soon. Besides, the sooner the story was out there, the sooner her little brother got the help he needed. Nervously, she said, "You're going to want to sit down for this."

xXx

Max shoved his hands into the pockets of his hoodie. The bustling streets of New York were a background hum as his mind replayed the actions of his evening.

He was angry. No, he was _furious_. How could Alex do this to him? How could she...?

How could she what? Save his life?

Did he really blame Alex for everything that had happened?

 _Of course not_ , the rational part of his brain said, finally making an appearance. _Thanks, brain. Where were you when I was yelling at everyone like a fucking basket case?_

It didn't matter. The reality was, no matter how long Max dwelled on the past, it didn't change anything. His friends were six feet under and he was walking the streets of his hometown without a visible scar.

Turning at a corner Max halted at a bar nearby. Without risking another second to give himself the chance to oppose, he entered the building.

xXx

Jerry looked at his watch again. It was past midnight now and Max still wasn't home. After hearing the summary from Alex and Justin almost everything had fallen into the unexplained gaps in Max's behaviour since he returned home. A part of him felt helpless and another part couldn't help but feel that this was his fault. Maybe…maybe if he hadn't been so hard on him, so dismissive, Max wouldn't have felt the need to take off and endure everything that had followed.

He shook his head. There was no point in dwelling on it now. The most important thing was to be there for Max this time. Give him however much support he needed to pull through his nightmares.

Just as he was about to try his son's phone for the umpteenth time he heard the sound of keys jingling outside the door.

Jerry's shoulders sagged in relief, but it was short-lived as Max seemed to have been taking twice as long to enter the building. Oh. Hell. _No_. He was not-

Max's feet stumbled beneath him as he pushed open the door, but caught himself before his body would tumble towards the carpet. He sloppily took off his hoodie when a lamp turned on behind him. Max's heart almost jumped out of his chest and he turned to see his father, clad in his robe and pyjamas, sitting on the sofa waiting for him.

"Where the hell have you been?" Jerry fumed. In his defence, this was not how he wanted to start this conversation. Within the first hour after everyone else had left Jerry waited for Max to simply talk to him and make sure he was okay, within the second hour he started to get worried when his son hadn't returned home, by the third his patience had thinned and now he was just irritated.

Max didn't give him the courtesy of replying. Besides, his brain was too preoccupied trying to make the room stop spinning. He rubbed his head and tried to blink away the oncoming headache.

Not receiving an answer Jerry marched up to him and grabbed his arm.

Instantly, Max recoiled at the touch, features crumpling into an expression that was entirely new to Jerry. Startled, he pulled back, chastising himself. Justin and Alex had only just told him what had been going on with Max. It should have been fresh in his mind but he supposed it would be difficult to remember that his own son would, for a long time, resist another person's touch.

Even so, Jerry was angry and he let him know.

"Jesus, Max. Did you drink the entire bar?" he said, the strong smell of ale and liquor surrounding his son. Jerry didn't know whether he felt more displeased or just...bad. Finally, he relented and decided to have a go at him for disappearing again in the morning, that way the hangover would make it more effective. Jerry watched his son for a moment and gently asked, "Are you hungry?"

Max shook his head, both his hands rubbing at his forehead.

"You should eat something. Come on." This time, Jerry was careful when he placed a hand on his arm, letting it hover a few inches above the skin before making contact. When Max didn't refuse his touch, he guided him to the kitchen. He grabbed the filter from the fridge and poured a generous amount of water for him. "Drink. You'll thank me in the morning."

With no energy left to argue, Max carelessly dropped into a seat and downed the entire glass wordlessly. Through tired eyes he watched his father grab some leftovers from the fridge he had prepared with his mother before having his episode. Upon its heating in the microwave, the smell suddenly hit his senses. His alcohol-filled stomach was unforgiving and Max felt the crashing wave of nausea rising in his throat.

Jerry had no time to react when Max raced to the kitchen trash and started violently heaving the remnants of the day. The microwave beeped but he ignored it and instead rubbed small circles on Max's back. "I'll get you some ginger ale."

"Don't bother," Max replied, hoarsely. He righted himself. "I'm going to bed."

"The hell you are," Jerry pointed at the chair. "Sit." It was one o'clock in the morning and he hadn't stayed up this late in years. Nevertheless, he felt his adrenaline surging. Something was going on with his son. Though Justin and Alex had given him a glimpse of what Max had been through, Jerry could only imagine how he was internalising the stress. One thing was certain, however, he couldn't keep letting his son retreat to his bedroom, alone. It was part of what had contributed to this mess in the first place.

Again, Max's hand drifted up to his temples, massaging them ineffectively.

His father pushed a bottle of ginger ale in from of him. "This will help."

Max fiddled with the bottle, sliding it between both hands. Uncapping the lid, he allowed himself a few small sips. Eventually, he looked up at Jerry who was still visibly upset. "Dad, please, I just want to go to bed."

"And I just want to talk. I need to know what's been going on in that head of yours lately."

Max felt himself getting annoyed. He was too drunk and tired to deal with his father's relentless interrogation. "You know what? I don't owe you any answers."

Jerry chose to ignore the jab and instead crossed his arms over his chest. "My broken bathroom door frame begs to differ. That's another $300 out of my pocket, by the way."

Max was starting to feel something snap within him. He had to get away. Placing the ginger ale on the counter, he made a beeline for the stairs.

"Is this how it's going to be?" Jerry demanded, gesturing at his inebriated son. "You're going to drink your problems away? You're going to ignore your family?"

"Ignore?" Max stopped walking and turned to face him, eyes glittering dangerously. His head was still throbbing wildly but for the sake of the argument he pushed it to the back of his thoughts. "Led by example, Dad."

"Excuse me?" Jerry sputtered indignantly.

Max's tone was biting. "After all these years it's outstanding how you think you can get away with doing the exact same thing to me."

Incredulously, Jerry said, "What the hell are you talking about, Max?"

"You never listened to me!" Max's arm flung outward, gesticulating uncoordinatedly. He almost felt bile rising up his throat again but the ginger ale helped to keep it down. He had to be careful, the last thing he wanted was to start retching while he was trying to prove himself. "Between Justin and Alex, I had to fight for your attention."

Jerry hesitated a fraction of a second too long, leaving the truth to fall heavily between them. As if trying to convince himself, he said, "That's not true."

"You wouldn't even let me pick the colour of the damn napkins for the restaurant, Dad."

"You were just a kid!" Jerry protested.

"No!" Max shouted, furious. "I wasn't _just a kid_ then and I'm certainly not a kid now. I'm a grown man. How many excuses are you going to give me until you finally just say what you really mean?!"

Jerry slammed his hand down on the island tabletop. "Fine, Max! You want honesty? You were irresponsible, your grades in school were below average and you hardly stuck to a project long enough to finish it. Instead, you chose to slack off whenever we gave you a chore and spent your allowance on an accident waiting to happen-"

"Of course you bring my Bonneville into this and it's not even here."

Jerry ignored him. "I couldn't let you handle big responsibilities. You weren't ready for them."

"You're wrong," Max insisted. "I changed a lot after the Wizard Competition. I started studying more, I helped out at the restaurant every day. The only thing I didn't do was go to college and you couldn't handle that."

Jerry rubbed his forehead in irritation. "We've talked about this before, Max. College would have been a good choice for you - it still could be. You can find a profession that you could really excel in…"

Max stared at the heavens and laughed in exasperation. He grabbed his head with both hands, frustrated. "Jesus Christ, Dad, you still can't seem to let it go!"

Up until now Jerry had kept a level-head but with Max pushing him like this, he felt himself falling right back into old habits. "Now wait a minute-"

"I wanted to excel working with the sub-shop but you didn't let me."

"You weren't ready!" Jerry argued. "Your mother and I wanted you to go out and experience other things before deciding on the family business."

"Well then guess what, I did. I travelled the world. Now what's your excuse?"

Jerry didn't say anything.

"Nothing comes to mind now, does it?" Max said, "It wasn't about experiencing other things or spending two useless years of my life at a junior college. It wasn't about realising I could be a dental hygienist or plumber or some other cooked-up nonsense that you and Mom thought of to distract me. Bottom line: you didn't trust me."

Jerry paused. "Max...there was so much more that you could have looked into and accomplished. Your mother and I weren't sure you should be so attached to the business at a young age-"

"See!" Max exclaimed, gesturing with both arms. "It's happening again! You're not listening to me. You only want what _you_ think is best for me. I had to join the goddamn Marines to get away from your... _persistence_."

Jerry faltered, expression wavering at his son's statement. "Is that...true?" he finally asked, voice quiet. "You joined the Marines...because of me?" He remembered his earlier suspicions, worried that previous interactions with his son had encouraged Max's departure.

"Yeah, kind of..." Max admitted. He rubbed his eyes with his thumb and forefinger, the peak of the argument taking its toll. "There wasn't a place for me here anymore."

Jerry sighed. "Look, Max, I'm sorry that you felt that way. That was never my or your mother's intention." He walked closer to him. "All we want, at the end of the day, is for you to make the right decisions."

Despite claiming it wasn't his intention, the sentence came out quite condescending to Max's ears. Still reeling from the nature of the argument and feeling the alcohol running in his bloodstream, Max snapped, "The only right decision I made was leaving this place and getting away from you."

Jerry felt something within him seize and ache with despair. Instead of letting it consume him, however, he channelled it to further his fury. Jerry seethed, "You know what? I have been patient and understanding-"

Max scoffed, "Do you hear yourself when you talk?"

" _Enough!_ " he snapped. "That's enough."

"You're right, Dad. Finally something we can agree on." Max turned to leave.

"Oh no you don't-" Jerry grabbed his arm.

Max pushed him away, "Get away from me!"

"What is going on?!" Theresa called out from the staircase. Max used this as an opportunity to finally get away.

Jerry watched him pass his mother and head straight up to his room. He rubbed his eyes tiredly. That was not at all how he expected this to go.

He looked up to see his wife glaring at him. "What?"

"Stop it," Theresa said. At her husband's confused look, she continued. "This feud between you and Max has gone on long enough."

"Theresa-" he tried to console but she moved back.

"No, Jerry. _¡Basta ya!_ I don't want to have to come in the middle of this or _God forbid_ wait another two years or even _more_ before I get to see my own son again. That's if he would come back the second time."

"This isn't just me, Theresa. This is your fight too," he insisted.

"I made my peace with Max's choices the morning I found out he left, it wasn't worth losing him over."

"Oh, so you're okay with him parading around town in that damn motorcycle of his and working through his issues in booze until after midnight."

"I didn't say that, and this isn't about me. This is about Max and whatever your problems are. I may have asserted my own decisions over his, but believe me, now that I have him back I am not going to make the same mistake twice. Whatever it takes, we're going to be there for him this time."

"What do you think I'm trying to do here?"

"Clearly a bang-up job."

He felt himself wearing down. "I'm _trying_ , Theresa. What else do you want me to do?"

"Try harder. Listen to him. And for God's sakes, sort this out. I mean it, Jerry." The determined looked on her face was palpable. "I am not losing my son again."

Jerry didn't argue, his brain already exhausted from the fight with Max. He watched her leave and spent a few more minutes thinking everything over, before finally heading to bed himself.

xXx

The next morning, Theresa knocked on Max's door. She had been up since six AM but had not wanted to disturb him since he'd most likely sport a hangover. She almost couldn't believe her husband when he told her that Max came home drunk at one in the morning. This was not her son, regardless of the fact that he was older, regardless of the fact that she hadn't seen him in two years. She knew her children, and she especially knew her little one. As much as she loved all her kids, Theresa always had a soft spot for her Maximilian. Maybe this would help bring her closer to him than his father.

He didn't answer the door. "Max?" she called, holding a breakfast tray. It was almost ten, judging by his previous mornings he'd always been up by eight. "I'm coming in…" She opened the door and quietly walked up to his dresser where she placed the tray. It consisted of a hangover cure her brother, Ernesto, taught her when she was sixteen and took advantage of a fake ID her best friend at the time got her. Despite telling herself she wouldn't get caught up Theresa ended up overindulging...all over her mother's floorboards. Luckily her brother was awake at the time and cleaned up after her mess, never telling their mom about the incident, one of the many reasons why he was her favourite brother.

Max hid under the covers, most likely to shield his eyes away from the sun streaming through his window. His back was to her, allowing Theresa some room to sit on his bed. She laid a hand on his shoulder. "Rise and shine, kiddo."

Max still hadn't moved. If he wasn't up for talking, fine. She wasn't going to push him. Theresa saw the full effect of that last night with Jerry.

"Okay, Max. I'm going to let you rest a bit more. There's some food beside you, it'll help with the headache." She paused. "I love you." Theresa felt a little disheartened when Max hadn't responded to that. Slowly, she got up and closed the door behind her.

When he knew his mom was gone, Max uncovered himself and felt bad for ignoring her but he just couldn't look at her yet, and he knew she'd get him to immediately open up, his mom always had that effect on him. Besides, it was for the best that she didn't see him in this state, all red-eyed, prickly stubble and pale, sunken cheeks. To be honest, it wasn't an image he was proud of either.

He sat up, careful as to not aggravate his headache. Max took in the smell of the food. He still felt nauseous, yet at the same time he was hungry. He hadn't eaten a meal since yesterday's lunch.

By ten thirty he was dressed for the day, but didn't know if he was ready to face his parents. Max quietly headed down to the sub-shop, and just as he approached the kitchen, he heard his dad's voice...

"...I get that but...how could he talk to me like that, Theresa? I raised that boy…"

Max shook his head and walked out the building without saying a word.

xXx

Justin felt like his brain was about to swell like a balloon. He knew paperwork was a necessary nuisance of being the headmaster, but the life-size piles of it taking up half of his office was just taking it too far.

There was a knock at his door. "Justin?" he heard his assistant on the other side.

"Come in, Penelope." Entered a young woman with what seemed to be...another pile of paperwork.

 _Seriously?_ he thought. "Seriously?" he voiced out loud.

Penelope sheepishly grinned and waved her wand to magically hover in two more huge stacks.

"Come on, the semester barely started! I don't recall the last few years being this loaded."

"You ought to thank your reputation for that. Your ideas for this school attracted a lot of eager parents."

He didn't know whether he felt smug or inconvenienced. Okay, maybe a little more smug, even if his assistant did say it as an excuse not to shoot the messenger. "Alright, you win this round," he smiled at her. She smiled back, blushing slightly, (he'd never admit it, but he always liked the ego boost). "Why don't you head to an early lunch?"

"Are you sure you don't need me to do anything else?" she asked, always eager to make an impression.

Justin smiled, he knew he hired the right person, much nicer than the grouchy old lady before her who retired and had a habit of munching potato chips loudly outside his office and constantly tried to set him up with her many granddaughters, because apparently, " _for a Mexican, you're very handsome_ ," despite telling her numerous times that he had a beautiful girlfriend whom he loved very much. He didn't know whether she was deaf or stubborn. "You've done quite enough this morning."

"Okay, thanks." Penelope headed to the door then stopped, "Oh, by the way, your sister's waiting for you by reception."

He raised his eyebrow. That was never good. "And you just left her outside alone?"

xXx

Harper shoved her phone into her bag with a curse. She didn't know how much more she could take from Medusa before throwing her boss's "extra special" non-fat Irish cream and peppermint mocha latte at her obnoxious face. Even though Harper was pretty sure there was no such thing as non-fat cream. Medusa may as well eat a pop-tart for breakfast, if her boss ever ate that is. She growled as she pushed open the café door and entered the only building that made the special coffee. She was lucky it wasn't across town like that disgusting sandwich she had to buy, even though Harper was pretty sure Medusa threw it away when she wasn't looking.

She went up to the counter and smiled at Kelly, her usual server.

"Medusa's usual?" the barista said.

"Make it a double. Her dragon scales are extra pointy today."

Kelly laughed. "Coming right up."

Harper sighed and looked around the fairly quiet café. As much as she hated her boss, she was glad she was sent on her coffee runs right before the midday shitstorm, where the lines were impossible.

Harper paused as her eyes gleaned over a familiar figure. She headed over to him automatically. "Hey!"

Max snapped out of whatever his mind was going over. He smiled when he recognised her. She was dressed in a professional white shirt and a black flared skirt that was a little too high. "Sorry, who are you again?"

"Right, because I'm never around ha-ha, very funny." She sat down across from him and almost grinned at the half-eaten cupcake, trust that some things never change. "How are you?" she asked, even though she already knew.

Max raised his eyebrow, catching on. "You don't have to pretend with me, Harper. I know Alex tells you everything."

It was true. When Harper was about to leave her apartment for the Russo dinner she opened the door to find Alex pulling out her key, her face visibly upset. Needless to say, the dinner was cancelled and the two spent the night talking and digging into caramel-flavoured Häagen-Dazs. "I wanna hear it from _you_ , Max. I'm tired of getting all the news second-hand."

He shrugged, fiddling with his coffee cup. "As well as expected, I guess." He then perked up. "Anyway, just the same I'm tired of talking about me. I wanna know what's been going on with you. I've been back for over a month and the entire time I've only seen you...once? And spotting each other that one time on the subway does not count!"

"Same old, same old, I'm afraid. Running around the city trying to please her highness." She pointed to her black tights and heels. "At least I look great doing it."

Max chuckled. "Do you even like your job?"

"I did...I mean, I enjoy what I do, don't get me wrong, but sometimes the people you work with make you forget."

Max smiled. "Tell me about it."

"Like, there's this one girl I used to work with. She was Medusa's former assistant who was finally promoted after three years, but by then our boss sent her to the brink of insanity. She ended up quitting her job and getting some help."

"Wow…"

"But I bumped into her recently and now she seems like a whole other person, like before she started this job." Harper briefly contemplated a thought. "She said the counsellor she saw was a miracle worker."

"Really?"

"In fact…" Harper got out her phone and typed a text. Within the next few seconds Max's phone went off.

He checked the message was from Harper and sent her a look that was somewhere between confused and amused.

"That's the miracle person's number."

He frowned. "Harper-"

"Just in case! I'm obviously in no position to tell people what to do - literally. But just in case," she said slowly. "That number is there for you."

A few seconds passed before he finally nodded.

"Medusa special?" the barista said as she approached their table.

Harper smiled and took the coffee. "Thanks, Kelly." The barista briefly replied "you're welcome" before heading back to her counter. Harper turned her attention to Max again as he was staring down his phone. "By the way." Without thinking, she moved a hand and placed it on top of his, lightly squeezing it in affection. Max looked at her. "I'm really glad you're back." She gave him a final squeeze then got up to leave.

"Hey, Harper?" Max called out. He smiled at her in appreciation, "Thanks."

She nodded and smiled in return, unaware he was still watching her as she turned to leave.

xXx

Alex was fiddling through Penelope's desk when she saw her older brother leave his office, and as she opened her mouth to say something he immediately rebutted, "No." She looked at him questioningly.

He continued, "No, you cannot decorate my halls, teach a lesson in defying the physics of saggy man-boobs, help the students get away with reckless magic, steal the "good stuff" from the cafeteria, suggest again that skinny jeans should be a part of school uniform, vandalise the entire school with street art-"

"Would you just let me speak?" Alex huffed. "I wasn't going to say any of that, and I still stand by the skinny jeans. School uniform is just unnatural." Alex followed her brother through the hallway. "Look, I was just gonna ask if you still had some of the old paintings I tried to get you to hang up."

"Oh, you mean the ones with the orgies, naked Gods, and endorsed bestiality?"

"Those are ancient Greek paintings and they're worth a lot."

Justin almost laughed, "Yeah, to perverts."

"This is why you barely passed art in high school."

"I got a B in it!" Justin retorted.

"B _minus_ , and only because you promised Ms Mayfield that you'd do her taxes." Justin tried to save face but Alex stopped him with a hand gesture. "Do you have them or not?"

Justin halted and pointed to a staircase down the hall. "They're in the attic."

She headed down and heard her brother yelling behind her, "And take those _Harry Potter_ posters while you're at it!"

xXx

Max walked through his family's sub-station through a minefield of hungry New Yorkers looking for a quick meal before hobbling back to their jobs like cattle. The peak hours arrived and Max took the opportunity to, once again, try and prove himself.

He smiled at his Mom who returned the gesture and trotted to the kitchen. Ignoring his father's almost surprised gaze towards him, Max shook off his jacket and grabbed a white waist-apron.

"Max-" his father started but he shut him down.

"Not now, Dad. I think that guy over there is about to bite into the man's arm in front of him." He walked off without a reply.

Jerry immediately got back to work when he heard his wife yelling another order.

xXx

She'd never, ever admit this to Justin, but for some paintings Alex would have to agree that only perverts would consider paying almost half a million to put up a huge portrait of group debauchery in front of their living room. Most of these paintings were originally in her gallery's basement because none of her co-workers liked to look at them. As a result no one paid attention when Alex snuck the paintings out and offered them to Justin to put up in the school halls as a joke.

But now the joke was on her because someone _had_ put an offer on them and now she needed to quickly search for them through this endless maze WizTech liked to call the attic and drive back to work.

"Come on...come on…" She perused through piles and piles of useless ornaments, a loose tetherball she could've sworn turned her evil once, and a book that tried to bite her finger off, but to no avail. She sat cross-legged and prepared to face defeat when she heard a noise. She looked around and started to feel a chill when she couldn't find a source.

Alex stood up. "I have got to stop visiting Justin at work." Just as she turned to leave she heard the noise again. It was like sheaf of whispers, almost as if they were...calling to her.

She swallowed. "Hello?" _Nice one, Alex,_ she reprimanded herself. _Play the horror cliché and get killed off first like Drew Barrymore. Although technically her boyfriend was the one who died first._ She shook her head, _screw this, Saffron can pretend to fire me later._

She stepped over the items she dispersed, carefully avoiding the book that thirsted for her fingers and almost made it to the door when she tripped. Alex groaned and blew her hair out of the way. She looked back and saw the item that caused her stumble and chuckled in relief because it had been one of the paintings she was looking for. Ahead of her she noticed more of her paintings and mumbled a shrinking spell to pocket them.

Relieved that she wasn't getting fired today Alex made way to the exit when she heard a thud behind her. She turned around and saw the sound came from a book, then she heard the weird incantation-like whispers again. This was where they were probably coming from.

See, if she was Justin, she would know better than to mess with magic she wasn't sure about. She laughed, like she would ever be Justin. She just hoped the book wouldn't bite her. Alex picked up the burly thing and placed it on a book stand that conveniently stood beside her.

She took a moment to assess the cover - some Latin writing and a triquetra knot with each point sticking out like blades below it, a symbol of Wicca. Her hands ran over the title, admiring the paleographic font. Her art history knowledge deducted that it was a form of blackletter, a font that dated back thousands of years ago. It said:

 _Liber Umbrarum e-_

She hummed. The phrase seemed familiar. Justin might've recited this to practise his boring lecture with the family. She should've paid some attention since her Latin was very rusty.

Liber...Liber...doesn't that mean child? Or freedom maybe?

Umbrarum...she definitely remembered this was something negative. Dark? Evil?

Put that together, what does that spell...Dark child? Evil freedom?

Okay, that couldn't be right, and what was the 'e' for anyway? Wait, there was more. Alex blew the dust away and waved it from her face.

 _Liber Umbrarum et Lux_

Oh that...still didn't make sense to her. Whatever, she'll use google translate later.

Alex opened the book, excitement running through her veins that soon deflated as she found that the book held...nothing. She couldn't help the disappointment building in her chest. All the effort she put into translating the ominous thing...what a waste. She flipped through more blank pages and almost closed the book when she noticed the first two pages stuck together. Couldn't hurt to check she peeled them off, careful not to damage the centuries-old book.

" _Victory_ ," she whispered to herself when she saw there was an actual spell on one of the pages. Now she should _really_ be more like her older brother in this circumstance and save herself the trouble of getting into trouble. Alex could already hear the alarm bells ringing in her head telling her not to recite it until she knew what it did. But before she could help herself, she instantly felt the words drawn to her:

 _"Hear us now, hear our plea,_

 _The hidden secrets, we shall see._

 _The spells and creatures of dark and light,_

 _May help protect us through our plight._

 _Hear now these ancient words,_

 _The oldest of gods invoked and heard._

 _Grant the powers to the chosen three,_

 _Guardians of Magic, let it be,_

 _Wizards of the seventh of the seventh."_

She closed her eyes, expecting some kind of havoc, but opened them when nothing happened. "Huh, well that was anticlimac-"

A gust of light and wind burst through the book and encircled her like a tornado. Alex dropped the book in fear and felt the surrounding magic. Within her, she sensed her powers amplify. It was so overwhelming she almost keeled over.

A third of the magic parted and flew down the bustling school halls, looking for its next domain where he stood between the packs of students, talking to his fellow teachers and assistant. The power engulfed him, causing the man to drop his mug of tea with a shattering clang. The hallway went quiet and the teachers tended to his sudden dizzy spell.

"Justin? Are you okay?" Penelope frantically asked, holding him upright as he looked like he was about to pass out.

The last piece of power surged out of the Wizard World and into its final home by the small street of Waverly Place. The wind, graceful and discreet in its movements, slithered easily through the walls of a sandwich shop.

xXx

"Enjoy," Max placed some desserts on a table full of customers and picked up the empty plates when he felt a push towards his chest so overwhelming his body gave out beneath.

The plates dropped from his hand with a resounding clash, causing the entire restaurant to come to a stop. His back hit the floor and he heard his mother yell for him before his mind blackened.

"Max?!" Theresa kneeled beside him, trying to shake him awake. "Jerry, get out here!"

Jerry rushed out of the kitchen when he heard the commotion and immediately knelt by his unconscious son. "Is anybody here a doctor? Anybody?" he called out, frantically. When nobody responded Jerry looked for any warning signals on Max's body. No profuse bleeding, his heart still seemed to function, albeit a little too fast, but he was breathing. That was important.

"I'm calling the medics," Theresa said as she pulled out her phone.

xXx

"Are you sure you're okay?" Penelope asked again, handing her boss a glass of water from the lounge kitchen.

"I'm fine. I think it was just a headrush from all the paperwork," Justin replied, in attempt to make light of the rather embarrassing situation. Almost fainting in front of his students and teachers did not bode well for his reputation as the dean.

"That must've been some headrush. You barely stood up straight," another teacher pointed out.

Justin looked up to find that they were all still watching him in concern. "I'm fine now. I promise. Everyone, just get back to your lunch break."

Reluctantly they spread out, all but Penelope who still insisted he head home.

"Really, I'm fine." He stood up without trouble. "See? Perfect health." Before she could respond Justin's phone rang. He pulled it from his robe pockets and saw the caller ID was his mom. His features pulled a surprised look, _How does she do that?_

He answered, "Hey, Mom, is everything-" Justin's face dropped.

xXx

Alex fell to the ground after the power surge calmed, heavily breathing. _What the hell was that?_

She'd think she'd learn her lesson after all these years not to mess with the unknown, yet here she was, reliving her old days where the word consequence was nothing but a mild inconvenience.

Alex stood up and moved away from the book, maybe if she ignored it this whole thing would go away.

"Alex!" Justin burst through the attic door, making her jump in surprise.

"I didn't do it!" she immediately refuted, covering her bases.

He looked at her confused. "What? No! We need to get to the sub-shop. Max collapsed."

Alex's eyes went wide, a part of her fearing that the spell had something to do with it.

They hurried through the family's portal door, both just missing the book that Alex had found that somehow made its way to their lair.

When they reached the shop, the paramedics were already there checking their brother's vitals. Max was awake now, sitting on a chair and breathing into an oxygen mask.

"I'm fine now, really," Max insisted, trying to push the mask out of his face but the EMTs persisted he keep it on a little longer.

"Max!" Justin called out as he and Alex jogged over. "Max, are you okay?"

"You called them?" he said to his mom in slight outrage.

Theresa wasn't fazed by his accusatory glare. "Of course I called them."

"What do you think happened?" Jerry asked the paramedics, cutting off whatever dispute Max was fishing for.

The female EMT ripped off the blood pressure monitor. "There's nothing definite, I'm afraid. But the good news is, he seems quite healthy now."

"Thank you!" Max immediately pulled the oxygen mask away from his face.

"Although," she continued, "your blood pressure could be a little bit lower."

"Is that what caused him to collapse?" Jerry asked again.

"It could've been a number of things, Mr Russo, but no need to be alarmed. From what Max described and what you told us about his rapid heartbeat, it might've just been a panic attack."

Max saw realisation cross his family's faces. "No, wait," he disputed. "That was not a panic attack. I know when I'm having them, that didn't feel like it at all."

They seemed to have ignored him as Jerry shook the medics' hands. "Thank you so much for getting here so quickly."

"We were actually just down the road so you were pretty lucky," the male EMT said smiling, then turned to Max. "Okay, Max. Keep an eye on that blood pressure of yours and do book an appointment at your local clinic just to make sure everything is in tip-top shape."

"You hear that, Max?" Jerry said to him, obnoxiously.

"I hear that, Dad," Max mocked. "I'm only three feet away."

The EMT turned to leave with his partner and did a double-take on Justin. "Nice robes, son. Late for your _Harry Potter_ convention?"

Justin sarcastically smiled as if to say, "hah, good one."

The paramedics walked out the door and everyone turned to the youngest Russo. Everything else in the diner seemed to have calmed and customers had gone back to their usual business.

"Are you sure you're okay, honey?" his mom asked. "Why don't you go upstairs and lie down?"

Max stood up. "For the last time, I'm fine," he said, agitated.

"There's no need for that tone, Max," Jerry said. "She's just worried about you. We all are."

"Why don't we book you an appointment at the clinic?" Alex suggested.

"I can do that myself just fine, thanks," Max griped, then composed himself. "As you were," he said, going back to work.

Jerry sighed and shook his head.

"That boy is going to send me to an early wad of grey hair," Theresa remarked, and said with finality, "He is going to that clinic."

The family dispersed and Alex turned to Justin. "I need to head back to work."

Justin nodded. "By the way, did you manage to find your paintings?"

"Hm? Oh yeah," she replied, trying to hide her guilt. "I shrunk them into my pockets." Behind him, she saw Max carrying out supplies in the distance and almost grabbed his attention when he turned his head away.

Justin saw the exchange and gave her a reassuring smile. "Hey, he won't be mad forever." Alex smiled in appreciation. "See you at dinner," he said, going back to the portal door. As she left the building to her parked car, she couldn't help but wonder what the effects of the book's spell were and what they may have entailed.

xXx

Hours and a Russo dinner later, Max found solace on the loft's terrace. He leaned against the railing, the soft air brushing against his skin and causing goosebumps to flare up. He exhaled and let his thoughts consume him. He was so lost in them he didn't notice Alex coming up to him until she placed her arms on the railing besides him.

"Hey," she started, unsure.

Max continued to stare at the sky. "Hey."

"Are you feeling any better?" she asked. He'd been silent the entire dinner.

"Just fine."

She nodded. Okay, so he was still short with her, but she was determined to say what was on her mind. "When you were little, I remembered how Mom forced me to always take you to the park with me, even though I just wanted it to be me and Harper. She always said, " _look after you little brother, Alex._ "" She shook her head in dismay. "But typical Alex, I'd always 'burden' that responsibility on Harper."

Max turned his full attention to her now. "Yeah, I remember that."

"Except one day, Harper had to go home early and it was just you and me. But I was too busy trying to negotiate prices with the ice cream man and when I went to look for you, you disappeared.

"After ten minutes, I started to get really scared. I thought of the worst. I looked everywhere in that park. Finally, I heard the ice cream man speaking into his megaphone, " _There is a Justin here with Max and that Alex, you are in big trouble_.""

Max chuckled slightly. "I remember that day. I was on the monkey bars and Justin came over and yelled at me because the last time I was on them I sprained my wrist. He got really annoyed when he couldn't find you."

"Of course he'd get annoyed. You told him I just left you alone in the park."

"Well you did, technically."

"No, I didn't _technically_ , I just popped down the road to buy us some ice cream."

"You mean buy _you_ ice cream, even though you didn't have any money."

She chuckled. "I didn't always set the best example, did I? It's always been like that, since you were born, " _look after your little brother_ " and for the most part, I was pretty terrible at it." She turned to him, her face serious. "But that didn't mean I would let you go off doing something I know would hurt you. That's why I had to give you the charm, Max. After that day in the park, I promised myself that I'd never let something like that happen again."

Max slowly blinked, reiterating his sister's confession in his mind.

"And if that meant you hating me," she thrust her chin up in a prideful manner, "then so be it."

Max sighed. "I don't hate you, Alex."

Alex felt relieved. "Really?"

"I may not like you sometimes," he added playfully. "But I don't hate you."

She paused. "Do you hate what I did?"

Max responded somewhere between a shrug and a head shake, trying to figure out his answer, then finally rubbed his eyes in slight frustration. "I don't know! It's…it's all very confusing." He thought it over between the silence. "I guess I know why you did it."

"You do?"

"Yeah, I'd be a hypocrite if I said I wouldn't do the same thing."

Alex smiled and rubbed his shoulder. "I know you would."

"Look, I don't blame you for...everything else, if that's what you think."

"That's good to know."

"And I'm also sorry."

She sent him a confused expression. "For what?"

Max tried to put his guilt into words. "For...yelling at you like that. It was wrong."

Alex smiled. "It's fine, Max."

"No, it's not. I saw your face. As soon as I raised my voice at you-" he sighed. Much as she tried to hide it, Alex burst into tears, and he just kept yelling. The worst part was..."You moved back," he continued, "as if…you were afraid of me. _I_ did that. I made you feel like that." Alex squeezed his shoulder in affection. "I don't know if I can forgive myself...how can I?"

"Because I have, Max. And you're right, it doesn't justify it, and it was little jarring having my little brother yell at me like that. But I'm not holding it against you. I promise." She moved in for a hug and was grateful when he let her in and returned it. "Ooh look," she said pointing to the dinner table inside. "I think Dad bought cake." They pulled apart. "So, are we good?"

Max smiled and nodded. "We never were otherwise. See you inside." He watched her walk back into the loft and demand for the biggest slice. He gazed through the clear doors at his family from the distance, envious of how easily they fell into routine. He missed that. He missed having not to carry so much strain on his shoulders. Maybe...maybe it was time he asked someone to help lift it.

Max pulled out his phone, still watching his family digging into cake, and dialled the number Harper had texted him.

The other line answered.

* * *

 **TBC**

* * *

 **AN:** Song suggestion for the Jerry and Max fight - _You Can Run_ by Adam Jones. Song suggestion for the ending scene - _We Are the Hearts_ by EXGF.

For the triquetra knot google "triquetra" and click on the wiki page, scroll down and click the one that says triquetra knot, it should look like three blades interlacing.

Hope you guys liked the chapter! Drop me a review and let me know :)

P.S. I should've mentioned this earlier but you may have noticed that sometimes the spelling in this story is a toss between American and British, and unfortunately those are the woes of having a bestie/editor that lives across the world. I'll definitely be aware of the NYC lingo (lucky for me she lives in New York) but please let me know if any words seem distracting or wouldn't fit in the dialogue, (e.g. I doubt Justin would swear with words like "bloody hell!").


	5. Guardians of Magic

**AN:** This chapter is dedicated to the absolutely wonderful **MirrorEclipsed** who left me a review that brightened my day. I hope this chapter brightens _your_ day :)

* * *

 **Guardians of Magic**

* * *

The night after his collapse Max sat by the kitchen counter, rubbing his restless eyes, his laptop screen glowing before him. He had just received an email from Dr. Lancaster, the therapist Harper had encouraged him to see, confirming an appointment in three days. Initially, he had given himself every excuse in his mind not to go, but the logical part of his mind always dismissed it. He had already refused military psychologists when he was on base, fearing that anything he would say would go back to his chain of command. If he said the wrong thing, they'd ship him back before he'd get the chance to redeem his name. Max was many things, but he refused to be called weak.

His primary concern was money; the military benefits programme did not cover civilian psychologists. But it turned out there was access to non-profit counselling and Harper's recommendation provided a programme for PTSD treatment. He finally conceded that there really wasn't any other option. He could wait it out...maybe the images would go away eventually. Perhaps this all would go away with a good night's rest. Or perhaps…nothing would change. The very real possibility was that he would likely have another panic attack. He was hardly ever alone anymore which meant that his parents would be spectators to what Max thought of as a private and vulnerable moment. Even more troubling was the idea of unintentionally hurting his family members. He didn't want to turn out like the many other soldiers he heard about when he was deployed - drunk, lashing out in anger, and unable to recognise the people they loved. Dread filled Max at the thought of ending up like that. He needed to feel like himself again; keeping up pretences was becoming more difficult by the day. He had already gotten drunk, shoved his father away and lashed out at Alex the previous night. If Max didn't get help now he feared that he'd fall down a similar path.

 _It's a slippery slope, my friend_ , he recalled Patrick's words when they sat around a campfire and Max couldn't wrap his head around the stories. _Shit like that sticks with you._

Max sighed and stared at his phone beside the laptop. Picking it up he texted, _I made an appointment_ , to Harper. As soon as he set his phone down, a thick file was placed next to him. Max looked up to find Jerry with a soft glint in his eyes and a face that had finally relented from its previous stubborn expression. He glanced down to realise that the file his father handed to him was, in fact, the sub-shop's monthly statistics.

Max raised his brow in surprise. His father had never given this responsibility to anyone, not even Justin. Not knowing what to say, he placed his hand on the file and slowly brought it towards himself.

"I'm always going to want what's best for you, Max," Jerry said. "Even if sometimes that means it's not what I want, or sitting back and letting you handle a few things," he cleared his throat, "or even you getting away from me. I'm sorry I didn't see it sooner."

As he watched his father walk away, Max said, "I was angry and hurt, and drunk when I said that."

Jerry smiled sadly. "You wouldn't have said it if some part of you didn't mean it," he said, before heading upstairs.

Max blinked, letting his mind process what had just happened. He opened the file and allowed himself a genuine smile.

Hours later, when it was already past midnight, Max was still rifling through the paperwork. He wasn't going to lie, the business was in a fair bit of trouble, but nothing a few budgetary changes wouldn't handle. The hard part was convincing his father, and as he was well aware, last time that ended with Max leaving late Thanksgiving.

He rubbed his tired eyes and silently invoked for more caffeine. Across the counter, Max did not notice the mug of coffee he had poured himself earlier slowly inching itself closer towards him.

xXx

Harper smiled at the text she received from Max. She replied, _I'm glad_ , and set her phone down when Alex walked back into the apartment.

"Hey, guess what," Alex asked rhetorically as she carelessly dropped on the sofa. "Max and I hugged it out."

Harper smiled, getting up from her sowing machine and taking a seat beside her friend. "See? I told you he wouldn't stay mad at you."

Alex's smile slowly faded. She fiddled at the cushion on her lap. "Yeah, well, I'm still worried about him. I want him to get help but I don't want to push my luck."

She gave her a knowing look. "I wouldn't be worried about that for too long."

"How do you figure?"

Harper hesitated. Should she tell her Max's business? On one hand, Alex was her best friend and Max was her brother. On the other hand, Alex tended to have a big mouth that could not only land them in Max's wrath, but discourage him from attending his appointment. "Okay, fine," she decided. "But you have to promise not to say anything, not even to your parents or Justin."

Alex sat up and nodded. "What do you know?"

"Yesterday I spotted Max at our usual coffee shop and talked to him about this therapist an old colleague of mine was seeing."

"He didn't push you away?"

"I didn't push _him_. Sometimes, you gotta hear it from other people, y'know?"

"And?"

"He just texted me." Harper pulled out her phone and showed her the message. "See? But you promised not to say anything. It could set him off."

Usually Alex would make a facetious comment about what an 'angel' she was and how she 'could never', but Harper stopped to find her sighing in relief, as if the weight of the world was lifted off her shoulders.

Alex said lowly, "Thank God." She looked at her best friend. "Thank you, Harper. You don't know how much this means to me and my family." She proceeded to hug her.

"Of course, Alex," Harper replied. "Max is family to me too. Even if he did obscenely gross me out when we were kids."

They both laughed and continued to talk about their day: the paintings Alex sold, the weird book in WizTech's attic, and the new method of torture Harper's boss had her testing out (it may have something to do with eight-inch platform heels), ending the night watching a marathon of _Games of Thrones_.

xXx

The next morning Justin walked through his parents' apartment door to find Max facedown on the kitchen counter, surrounded by paperwork. Briefly, Justin snorted to himself and thought, _I know that feeling, buddy._

He walked up to his brother and shook him slightly. "Max?"

Max immediately shot up, eyes wide with something akin to terror. Justin felt an instantaneous flash of guilt, remembering his brother's sensitivity to such abrupt touches.

"Max?" Justin asked, after a prolonged silence.

Amusingly, Max had a copy of a recent electrical bill stuck to his cheek. He looked at his older brother with a confused expression, lost in the vision that only he could see. Finally, he sputtered, "Wha-? What's going on?" he asked, only it came out in a blur of "Whazzg'non?".

Once it seemed as if Max had relaxed once more, Justin laughed. He didn't know what was more amusing, Max's dopey expression or half of his hair sticking out at comical angles. "You slept out here all night?"

"Huh?" Max blinked as Justin peeled the paper off his cheek. "Oh, yeah. I was just doing the, um…" He trailed off, rubbing at his stubbly jaw.

"Wait, this is the shop's cash float," Justin said in surprise, glancing down at the bill. "How did you get this?"

"Dad gave it to me," Max said, almost smugly.

"What?! He never let me do this! Even when I was in charge when Mom and Dad went to conventions."

"You were never in charge."

"Yes, I was. Alex just told you that she was so you would do her chores for her."

"Actually, she bribed me with cupcakes and ten dollars." Max huffed indignantly. Under his breath, he added, "I never did get that ten dollars."

"So Dad just handed this over to you?"

Max paused. "Don't you have your own place now? Why are you always here?"

Justin put his hand to his chest and blustered, "Oh, so you don't want to see me, your big brother, after you decided to disappear for so long-"

Max groaned and mumbled, "It's too early for this. Look, all I asked was for more responsibility and, to be honest, I don't know how it concerns you. You have WizTech now, why do you care about who looks after the shop?"

"It's still a family business and I don't want it to sink." Justin instantly regretted his words the second they came out of his mouth. Looking at his brother's stunned expression he amended, "I didn't mean it that way."

Max raised his eyebrow in doubt. "How's Juliet?" he asked, diverting the conversation as he collected the papers and shoved them into one pile. He didn't miss the way Justin avoided eye contact.

"Fine. Good. We're great," he replied, almost a little too quickly. "Perfect."

"That's a lot of adjectives."

"I used great as an adverb."

"Whatever." Max stared at Justin who was tapping on the counter. "Trouble in paradise?"

"We live in an apartment next to a fruit market, I hardly call that paradise." Max stopped what he was doing. "Okay, maybe there's a little trouble."

Max tapped the seat next to him, directing his brother to sit. "Tell your bawl brother." Justin looked at him confused. "I wanted to say agony uncle, but that didn't work."

"And you thought 'bawl brother' sounded better?"

"Stop changing the subject. What happened?"

Justin sighed. "I don't know. One minute we're talking, the next we're...having a discussion about our future."

"Wait, did _she_ bring that up or you?"

"I did. What does it matter?"

"That means _you_ want to take the next step and _she_ wants things to stay the same."

Justin was caught by surprise. "How did you know that? I didn't even tell you anything about the fight."

"I thought you said it was a 'discussion'," Max air-quoted.

Justin paused. "Maybe a heated discussion…" he mumbled.

"Look," Max took a hold of his brother's shoulder. "You and Juliet are the strongest couple I know, aside from Mom and Dad. You will work it out, I promise."

"No offence, Max, but you haven't been around in the last few years. You don't know what's been going on."

Max felt a slight sting from the jab. "Well, unlike you, Alex made the effort to keep me updated during my travels."

Justin turned away. An awkward silence fell between them. "Maybe she's right. Maybe I should just slow things down. I mean, she _has_ lived for hundreds of years-"

"Two thousand, if I recall."

"Yeah, so she's probably not in any rush."

Max nodded in agreement.

"You know, she's gone to visit some family in Pittsburgh. I have the apartment to myself. If you don't have plans today we could maybe hang out, see my place?" Privately, Justin knew this would give him the discreet opportunity he had been waiting for to talk to Max about getting help.

Max smiled. "I'd like that." They got up. "Just let me shower first. Oh, and I'll get us a six-pack."

Justin's face scrunched up. "Ugh, why? Beer tastes like bitter soap."

"You've had bitter soap?"

"No, but I'd imagine it'd taste better."

"It doesn't."

Justin stared at him.

xXx

Harper paid the salesman in Wizard currency as he placed her newly purchased earrings in a small paper bag. She fell in love with the silver pair instantly, the dream-catcher chic and dangly synthetic feathers drawing attention to her outfit; it consisted of a feathered skirt she put together this morning.

"Thank you," she said to the man and caught up to Alex who just bought two Wizard-style churros (Harper side-eyed the supposedly 'Wizard' part of the ingredients, which later turned out to be a hot spice to give the snack an extra 'oomph').

Alex was already biting into hers as she handed one to Harper. "Donchu jush lufvese," she said with a mouthful.

"We talked about this, Alex. You swallow or I heimlich. Pretty sure I earned three medals by now."

She swallowed. "Sorry, these get better every time."

Harper felt the spice rolling in her mouth. She let out a few small gasps. "Don't you find them a little hot though?"

"Hello, Mexican," Alex said in an obvious tone. "My mom makes food twice as spicy."

"I remember those nights," Harper grumbled, recalling her homelife with the Russos; her tongue was never the same after Mrs Russo's punishingly spicy dish of chilate de pollo.

Harper pulled out her water bottle and downed a few sips when her eye caught something ahead. It was a building that was magically being put together by construction workers. They raised their arms in the air, manoeuvring the bricks and equipment with care and grace. As she and Alex passed the building, a chill ran down her spine. She couldn't explain it exactly, but it felt like...something bad was going to happen, and not just the typically 'bad' situations that Alex liked to drag her in the middle of, but it was a vibe she could only remember feeling once in her life - at her Uncle's funeral.

"...ish yours?"

Harper shook her head, ignoring the random chill. "Sorry, what?"

"I asked if you were going to finish yours," Alex pointed to her churro.

Harper rolled her eyes and prepared to give her the snack when they both heard screaming behind them. They whipped around to find heavy pieces of equipment slipping from a few stories high and one of the men controlling them below had fell to his knees, his hand to his heart.

It happened so quickly. The worker felt chest pains. There was an unbalance of power amongst the team. The equipment moving upwards paused in the air and quickly made a downfall when none of them had the strength left to keep them up. No one had time to move out of the way.

Without thinking, Alex squeezed her eyes shut and whipped out her hands in reflex.

At the sound of silence, Alex blinked. She looked to find that her hands were in the air, and so was the heavy equipment.

"Are you doing that?" Harper said, loudly enough for everyone in the tensely quiet vicinity to turn to her.

"I...I don't know."

"How are...where did you...your hands...?" Harper didn't know where to start.

"Keep that up!" one of the workers yelled at her, as he and a few others helped to pull their fallen colleague out of the way. When everyone cleared the area Alex pulled her arms down, and with that everything fell with a ear-splitting crash.

Once the debris cleared, Alex saw that all eyes were on her.

xXx

"Justin, what are we doing here? I thought you said we were going to your place?" Max griped, walking down the halls of WizTech.

"We are," Justin reassured. "I just forgot a few things from my office."

Max followed his brother, his eyes gleaning over the classrooms, some of which were filled with students. "Uh, last I checked teenagers liked to avoid school where possible. Why are they here on Saturday?"

"I've set up some revision classes on Saturday mornings for anyone who's falling behind."

"Only you would make school happen on a weekend."

"For your information, Maximilian, the student committee were the ones who came up with the idea."

Max muttered, "Some nerds never change."

Justin huffed. "Do you and Alex have meetings where you come up with ways to undermine me?"

"Not that you know of," he grinned.

They reached the reception desk where Penelope had just walked out of a stationary cupboard with a herd of textbooks. She tut-tutted when she saw her boss.

"I'm clocked out, I promise," Justin said, his hands up in a form of surrender. "I just came back to get some paperwork from the crazy piles _you've_ given me."

"Fair enough," she smirked, then stopped when she saw someone beside him.

Justin caught on and said, "Oh, this is Max."

"Your brother?" she said, surprised. From what Alex told her, their brother had taken off not long before she started her job at WizTech. She recalled how Alex always excitedly boasted about him and his adventures with a proud smile on her face whenever she was visiting Justin at work. Her boss, on the other hand, hadn't spoken much about him, or at all, not that she ever pried.

It was rather an odd sensation, hearing about a person for years and then meeting them for the first time.

Justin turned to Max, "This is Penelope, my assistant."

Penelope smiled at the man; he was taller than she expected, (then again she was five foot two, anyone was taller). The man gave her flirty smirk as they shook hands. "I've heard so much about you it's like I already know you!"

Justin didn't miss the look shared between the two and he didn't like it one bit. The last thing he wanted was his brother to get entangled with one of his employees. If it went south, he'd have to start the excruciating recruitment process all over again.

Max grinned. "Justin talked about me?"

There was a brief pause in which Penelope hurriedly thought of what her next answer should be. "Uh, sure."

"What are you doing here anyway?" Justin asked his assistant before his brother could pry further.

"Detention duty," she replied without breaking eye-contact with his brother.

"Penelope, why don't you head back to the classroom. We can't leave ruffians with magic unattended for too long."

"You got it, boss," she said, walking away and thanking her decision to wear a figure-complimenting pencil skirt today.

Max's eyes followed her, his attention falling lower than what Justin deemed appropriate.

"Hey." Justin pulled at his brother's arm into his office. "Assistants like her are hard to find. I'm not going to look for another one just because you can't keep it in your pants," he scolded, not that he remembered if Max ever…Come to think of it, his brother never really talked to him beyond the occasional tips he asked about second base when he was sixteen. Justin remembered how his parents trusted him with the responsibility of that talk, figuring Max would have a better chance of not switching off if his older brother was the one going into detail. It still felt awkward as hell, but it beat his own motifying conversation with their dad when he was fourteen.

The realisation made Justin rather sad. It had been so long since he had a heart-to-heart with Max he could no longer pinpoint the significant aspects of his little brother's life.

The last relationship Justin could recall was Max's high-school sweetheart, Talia. But she broke up with him when she was heading to college in California. Max was so heartbroken over it he hadn't dated anyone till the day he took off. But now Justin had to wonder…had Max ever met anyone during his travels? Or just found somebody he liked? Fell in love? Who did he ask for tips about _third_ base? If he went that far? He hoped to God that he was being safe.

These were the questions he should be asking if he wanted to get to know his brother again. In some ways, Max was the same - still he liked to add fries in his sandwich like Alex and marshmallows in his asparagus, still his favourite breakfast was abuela's omleta, still he absurdly referred to himself as 'The Great Maxini' when he did one of his stupid parlour tricks with their bemused mom. But in many other ways, Max was different - he was older, his eyes matured, his spirit battled demons…he was closed off. Justin wanted Max to open up to him again, especially with all he had been through.

The elder sibling picked out the paperwork he needed, half of his attention at Max who was browsing through the decor in his office.

"I like what you did with the place," Max said, nodding in approval. "From the lack of posters, I take it that Alex didn't do this?"

"Nor will she ever again," Justin retorted, making his brother laugh. He missed that, Max letting down his guard and being the jovial kid he'd grown up with.

"I, uh, especially like the painting of the woman getting it on with the swan."

"What?!" Justin walked over to the painting closely hidden between his cabinets. It was probably the least tasteful picture he'd ever laid his eyes on. "Alex!" he cursed. How did she even manage to sneak this one in? Great, now his assistant probably thought he was a pervert. He shrunk the painting and pocketed it, thinking of ways to get back at her. "Let's just go."

Max and Justin walked out the door, making their way down the hallway when they heard scuffling and echoes of students. As the dean, Justin felt the duty to check up on it. They followed the noise and came to a stop at the school diner, and to his utter vexation, Justin saw through the door window that his cafeteria was being vandalised with food by the detention scallions. They weren't even supposed to be in this area!

Justin immediately shot through the door and started yelling at his students. "Stop this instant!" he roared. He rushed to the middle of the room, magically creating an undetected circle around him that repelled any food coming towards his way.

"Whoa," Max said, his inner fifteen-year-old beaming at the food fight. "Awesome!"

"Not awesome!" Justin retorted. The last thing he needed was for his students listening to the wrong adult. "Jacob, I see you! I will be contacting your parents about this!"

Jacob grinned mischievously, ignoring his headmaster's warning. Instead, he lifted his food-filled hand and threw it towards him with as much strength as he could muster.

Reflexively, Justin moved out the way in time for it to fly behind him and towards his brother. He just about caught Max pulling his arm to his face, only for the food to somehow shove itself away from him and into the wall towards the side.

Justin's mouth dropped in surprise, as did Max's. Before Justin could evaluate what happened, his attention was pulled when more food was thrown in front of him. "That's it!" he yelled, and the entire room was put to a halt.

Everything and everyone was at a standstill. The students found themselves unable to move, their eyes shifting side to side.

"Whoa, Justin!" Max exclaimed, his brother didn't even use a spell. "Where did you learn to do that?"

Justin blinked, staring at his hands. "I didn't…"

xXx

Alex burst through their family's portal door, Harper following behind.

"Are you sure you've never done something like that?" Harper asked, realising she still had her churro in her hand. She threw it in a nearby bin, her appetite gone.

"Hold up almost a tonnes-worth of equipment in the air and prevent them from crushing people?" she asked rhetorically. "Yeah I'm pretty sure. Magical strength works in the same way as physical strength, Harper. If I can't lift a twenty-pound dumbbell how do you expect me to juggle heavy machinery in the wind?"

"You can't lift twenty pounds? Man, you need to start working out."

"Harper!"

"Then how do you explain what happened, Alex?"

"I don't know! I wasn't even thinking when I was doing it. But I'm sure there's an explanation. Maybe if we just-" she stopped suddenly, staring at a bookstand by the corner of the lair.

Harper felt her skin flare up in goosebumps at the stunned look on her friend's face. She turned around, expecting to see some sort of monster coming out of hiding. "What's wrong?"

"It's the book…" she said slowly.

"What book?"

"The book I found in WizTech." Alex paced towards the item and grabbed it from the stand, bringing it to Harper who automatically moved two steps back.

"The blank one?"

"Not anymore," Alex said, incredulous to find that the book has now been filled with spells and potion mixes. "Harper, look."

The red-head kept her distance. "No, thanks. I'm content with where I'm standing - closer to the exit when that 'tornado of magic' you described comes bustling out the book again."

Alex rolled her eyes and brought her attention to the spells in the book. "I don't understand." She closed it. "Why is it here?"

"You didn't take it?"

"At first I was tempted, but after the whole 'tornado of magic' thing I was afraid it might be more dangerous than useful."

"So, what, it just followed you here?" Harper suggested, doubtfully.

"What're you two doing in the lair?" The two of them jumped at the sound of Justin's voice by the entrance. He and Max had just walked through the portal door. They stared at her and Harper suspiciously.

"I should be asking you two the same thing," Alex sniped back.

Justin was about to reply but stopped short at the item his sister was holding. "What is that?"

"What's what?" Alex tried to hide the book behind her, which was ridiculous considering how bulky it was.

Justin marched forward and made a grab for it, much to Alex's protests. "Liber Umbrarum et Lux?" he read, an incredulous look on his face. "Alex, this is a grimoire."

"Oh, is that what it says?"

"No, _Libre Umbrarum et Lux_ means Book of Shadows and Light."

"I wasn't even close," Alex mumbled to herself.

Justin continued, "You'd know that if you ever paid attention in Wizard School."

Alex pried the book from her brother's hands and opened it in wonderment this time. "Wow, a grimoire! I always wanted to find one, but they're so rare."

"I assumed they were extinct altogether," Max said. "Although I did make one when I was twelve."

Justin scoffed. "You made a two-sheet handout on how to cook with beef fat."

"Are you really gonna stand there and hate on my cookbook when you stuff your face with twinkies?" Max smiled smugly.

"What cookbook? It was, like, two pages - wait, what do you mean by twinkies?"

No longer wanting to listen to this conversation, Alex interrupted, " _Anyway_ , the very little records of grimoires we do have are from being passed down a long line of aristocratic Wizards." She placed the book back on the stand and continued to flip through the pages of spells. "There's only a handful in the world."

"Which begs the question, where did you find this?" Justin asked, accusingly. "Please don't tell me you stole it."

"Okay," she pointed a finger at her older brother, "for the record, the things I do, or _used to do_ , were _morally_ questionable not criminally."

"Your bans in three different islands beg to differ."

"Uh, _two_ , last I checked," she corrected with her fingers.

"Alex!"

"I found the book, okay? In _your_ school to be exact. So really, if it really were stolen, _you'd_ be the criminal."

"I would remember if I had a grimoire in my possession."

"It was in the school's attic, and if I'm being honest it appeared out of nowhere."

"Books can't just appear out of nowhere, somebody would have to be moving them."

"Who would be moving them and why would they give it to me?"

"Perhaps, I may help answer that." All four turned to find Professor Crumbs standing in the middle of their lair. There was a moment of silence between the siblings.

Max blinked. "Was he always standing there?" he whispered.

"I can still hear you, youngest Russo, and no. I just about caught the last remnants of your conversation."

"And you're here because you have the answers," Justin stated, his confidence in the former headteacher of WizTech never wavering.

"I do. But before we get to the answers you immediately seek, I must first provide you with the story behind the book. A tale of-"

Alex groaned, mirroring her teenage years. "Ugh, can't we skip the history lesson? I just want to learn the spells."

"Alex!" Justin reprimanded her, pointing a finger to his lips. "Shh!"

"Don't shush me."

"Where did the book come from?" Max asked, interrupting his siblings before they fell into their restless bantering. "Did it really appear out of nowhere?"

"One would say it has been sent to you three for a reason."

"Us _three_?" Alex said. "Um, I don't think so. The book sought _me_."

Professor Crumbs stared at her with a knowing look. "So it was just you who felt the wave of magic increase within you?"

Alex's eyes widened, _the power surge_.

"Wait," Justin said. "Is _that_ what that was?"

"What was?" Max asked, starting to feel lost in the conversation like he used to be during his magic lessons with his father.

"That weird dizzy spell I had yesterday. It was like my powers were...were..."

"Overwhelming you?" Alex finished. "You felt that?"

Crumbs then turned to Max. "And how about you, young master. Have you felt anything change within you yesterday?"

The only odd thing Max felt the day before was the air leaving his lungs as he collapsed to the shop's floors.

A light-bulb clicked in his mind. "When I collapsed. That dizzy spell you guys had, I think I had the same one. How's that possible?"

"Uh-oh," Alex guiltily said.

"What do you mean 'uh-oh'?" Justin felt an Alex-migraine coming on. "Alex, what did you do to us?"

"Nothing! I mean, not _nothing_. Look, when I opened the grimoire it had blank pages and only one spell in front of the book."

"So naturally you recited the only spell in a suspiciously blank book that appeared to you from nowhere."

"What can I say? I have a natural curiosity."

"Until that curiosity lands us in unnatural trouble. God, you never change."

"Guys!" Max interrupted. "What does this mean? What did this spell do?"

All three turned to the elder Wizard. Crumbs smirked. "You mean to tell me you don't at all feel different? What about you, Max? Why don't you recap what happened in school today?"

Justin looked up. "How do you know about that?"

"You were in school?" Alex asked Max, to which everybody ignored.

Max felt himself shrink under all the staring. "I…" he exchanged a look with Justin, who nodded in encouragement. "I think I did magic."

Alex's eyes widened. "What? That's impossible."

Harper stepped in, "More impossible than you telepathically stopping the weight of two vehicles from crushing people?"

All eyes then turned to Alex. "What does she mean?" Justin asked.

"I think maybe Max's explanation warrants more priority here, Justin," Alex said, then turned to her little brother. "You think you did magic? How?"

"It wasn't even a big deal. There was a food fight in the cafeteria and I just thought about not getting food thrown my way and it somehow...flew away from me. For all I know, Justin could've been the one doing it."

"Max, I was a little too busy trying to break up five different fights to think about saving your face from pumpkin pie."

"It was a taco."

"Whatever piece of culinary," Alex said, "it doesn't change the fact that you moved it with your mind, Max."

"What about your incident with cars?"

"It wasn't cars," Alex explained. "Harper and I were walking down the Wizard market when we heard screaming by a construction site. Some guy had a heart attack or something-"

"Sensitive," Harper remarked.

"I saved him, didn't I?" Alex shot back. "I stopped the machine thingies from crushing everyone."

"So wait," Justin said, processing his thoughts. "We all had some kind of magical incident?" He turned to his mentor. "How can a spell do that? How can it give a mortal-" he pointed to Max, "-Wizard powers? The only thing in the world that makes that possible is Merlin's hat, and that's just for a day."

"Might you be tempted to hear the tale now, Alex?" Crumbs said, knowingly smiling. She didn't respond, signalling the former professor to continue. "You see, young Wizards-" he paused, looking at Harper, "-and others, Magic has been around since the beginning of days and there was a time when it was open to the world. But like the many proclivities rooted in mortal history, the flame of fear inside the hearts of many men burns their ability to feel esteem towards those who are different, and a fire you cannot control spreads wildly." Crumbs watched the faces before him, their attention held onto him tightly. "Unfortunately, there are also those in our own community who feel that their powers hold them in higher regard than mortals. Eventually, this led to the outbreak of the Wizard War."

"I read about that," Justin chimed in, excitedly.

"Of course, you have," Alex and Max mumbled.

"Don't you guys remember? Dad was explaining how Merlin tried to keep peace between the lands, but there were those who opposed his views and didn't agree that all human species should be equal in this world."

"That's right, Justin," Crumbs praised. "Merlin had done everything in his power to keep the peace between mortals and magic, may his soul rest in peace. After his untimely passing, that frail solidarity had shattered.

"Good Wizards had risen, and as you live and breathe today, we won. But not without needless death and wreckage. The Wizard Council, led by my grandfather, sought the Temple of Good Magic and pleaded to our Gods that we cannot let this happen again. The Gods had granted our wish with a prophecy, so that should this happen again, a bigger balance of power shall tip the scales to good magic favourably. This high power of light magic shall grow increasingly with every new millennium through a generation of a Wizard family until one day, three siblings are born from the seventh son of the seventh son."

"Seventh of the seventh?" Justin had heard of this legend, but not as magic of light. "Doesn't that have...dark connotations?" At least, that was what he read from folklore.

"Mortals fear what they do not understand. This panic breeds the need to overtake and control what they feel threatened by, including the stories we hear over the centuries. Wizardry was and always will be deemed as dangerous and sinful. Thus, at the end of the war, our ancestors went into hiding for many centuries, till magic wilted into rumours, till it became nothing but stories among the young generation, till our very day where it's now deemed the impossible."

"But the legend states that it's a son that's born with an unbroken line with no female siblings. And he's a werewolf, or vampire or some healer."

"Where did you read that? Mortal wikipedia?" Crumbs mocked playfully. "In our world, legend speaks that the seventh son of the seventh son is special, not because he's a werewolf or vampire, but because he shall father three siblings that have the potential to become the chosen ones."

"Justin," Alex said, "our grandfather has six brothers."

"So that means... _Dad_?" Justin said. "And Kelbo? And our Aunt Megan?"

Crumbs sighed. "Unfortunately, that was not to be. You see, Gods advocate the power of free will. It is all about making choices, and the choices made between your father and his siblings led to a fragile bond they could not hold. A bond between siblings can make or break your magic; if that bond is not strong, neither is the magic between them."

"So what does this mean for the prophecy?" Max asked.

"I mentioned that your father and his siblings had the _potential_ , which means the prophecy shall still be filled...perhaps to the next line. Your father, a wizard, had made the choice to give up his powers when he married a mortal. It was a decision founded on pure love that brought together two worlds through their children. This very well may have granted the reward of great power to your line once again."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," Max said. "Are you saying...that _we_ have the potential to be the chosen ones now?"

"No," Crumbs said. "You three are no longer just the potential to be the chosen ones. You _are_ the chosen ones, from the moment the book found its home to you."

All four jaws dropped.

Crumbs continued. "It is said the book itself has been formed by the Gods of magic, prophesied to appear when the Wizard World is in need of the chosen three, the Guardians of Magic."

"Guardians of Magic…" Max tried out the words, letting the overwhelming information sink in.

"But _us_?" Alex said. "Are you sure?"

"Gods don't stutter, my dear."

"What exactly are we chosen for?" Justin asked.

"A great big change that will be coming our way."

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"It means, young master," Crumbs explained, "that you three have a journey ahead of you."

* * *

 **TBC**

* * *

 **AN:** Phew, this was the hardest chapter to write so far. I've been staring at a blank document for months, and whatever I did write I kept rewriting and rewriting and rewriting...And honestly, I never have the intention to make my chapters long when I start them, they just end up that way. This one's not particularly my favourite or my strongest, but a necessary start for what's to come. And there's a lot of shit coming!

The painting that Alex snuck into Justin's office comes from Greek mythology and the story is about Zeus seducing Leda in the form of a swan. Not gonna lie, there were some weird-ass paintings.


	6. Call of the Sea

**AN:** Charmed-inspired chapter. Tailored to my ideas, of course :)

Huge thanks to my two lovely reviewers (three if you count my ever-talented editor). Sending my cyber-hugs to **MirrorEclipsed** and **Guest**!

Also, remember when I referred to a previous chapter as a "22-page monster"? Hah. Hahahaha.

* * *

 **Call of the Sea**

* * *

Alex rolled over the bed and groaned, blindly searching for her phone annoyingly buzzing on her bedside table. She was about to put it on snooze, almost convincing herself to skip work altogether when Harper yelled through the door.

"Don't even think about it! We need food next week and you earn more than I do."

Alex wrapped her pillow around her ears, trying to ignore her.

"Do you want the thought of last month's incident to cross my mind?"

This time Alex shot up, not willing to undergo another cold, wet awakening. "I'm up!" she called out. "Keep that thought out of my room!"

After getting dressed Alex skidded to the kitchen, where Harper handed her some buttered toast, and out the door yelling, "Thee ya'," with a mouthful of breakfast.

She reached the gallery by nine and sorted through the mail on her desk, and as always she didn't bother opening any of them until her eyes sought the word 'payslip'.

Alex looked up when she heard a groaning. She groaned herself as the pipe near the bottom of her cabinet started leaking again. Alex had been harassing her boss to get that fixed, and he always replied, "Stop scaring away clients and we'll have the money to fix it." She bent down and twisted the handle until the leaking stopped. One of these days this thing was going to burst, and she prayed to all mischievous Gods that her boss will be standing next to it and that she would be there to witness the whole thing when it happened.

Shaking away her blissful fantasy, Alex went back to planning the opening of tonight's exhibitions. This evening they're featuring an artist that Alex had found herself while she was painting in the freedom tunnel, she had to tweak the location of her finding to convince her boss to allow his paintings to be up ("I found his work when I was visiting family in Italy.") but the paintings were remarkable enough to convince him anyway. This was the part of her job that she loved - everyone basking in the brilliance of her discoveries.

With the help of her co-workers and newly-promoted assistant manager, Abigail, her gallery was looking like a million bucks by the evening. The gallery was staying up till nine tonight and she needed to make sure drinks were rotating at a constant pace (the drunker you are, the more likely you buy), and to speak to as many potential customers as possible, encouraging them more champagne and 'mysterious' details of the new artists. She was discussing a particular piece on the wall to an older woman with money to spend when she was pulled aside suddenly.

"I need your help," a girl, about Alex's age, whispered frantically.

Alex, annoyed by the lack of boundaries this girl seemed to have, told her, "I'm sorry, ma'am. I'll be with you in a few moments."

She grabbed Alex by the arm. "I need your help now."

Alex pulled away, a little spooked. "Madam, you're just going to have to wait-"

"I'm not looking to buy a painting!" she snapped. "We have a mutual friend - Professor Crumbs."

Alex looked around, making sure no one heard them. "Abigail," she called to her colleague, "I'm just going to deal with a client in my office. Keep an eye on things here." With a nod from Abi, Alex tipped her head to the direction of her office. They walked inside and Alex closed the door for privacy.

"Who are you?" she asked, noting the woman's frazzled appearance. Whoever this woman was, she looked like she was in trouble.

"My name is Cassandra, Cas for short. I originally sought the professor but he said that you were the right person to help me. Is it true? Are you really a chosen one?"

Alex was surprised, they had only recently learned of their new-found heritage a few days ago. "Wow, word spreads fast in the Wizard World."

Cas chuckled. "The magical community is smaller than you'd imagine. And I'm not from the Wizard World-"

There was a knock at the door. Alex put a finger to her lips, quieting Cas before she exposed anything. "Come in."

Her boss walked in with his infamous vein throbbing on his forehead. Good thing he wore the tie for it. "Alex, there is a buyer outside who-" he paused, noticing that she wasn't alone. "Oh, I do beg your pardon," he said to the woman, then turned to Alex. "Miss Russo, when you're done here, there is a buyer who is eager to make a very, _very_ , generous deal."

"Let Abigail handle it."

Saffron almost sputtered, but he didn't want to lose his cool in front of a potential customer. "Abigail is still fairly new at her position. I'd feel more comfortable if you handled it." (Translation: Are you kidding me? You want the newbie to handle one of our biggest buyers? Have you lost your mind? Do you plan on getting fired tonight?). He turned to the woman with the biggest smile, "Alex is one of my best workers."

Alex didn't know what he was trying to sell more - the paintings or his fakest customer tone yet. "Fine, fine," she said, dismissively. (Translation: Woe is me. Just kidding. I love being top dog. You won't fire me.)

When he walked out the door, Alex turned back to Cas. "Sorry," she apologised. "You were saying?"

"Right, I came to you for help because-" Cas stopped when she heard a groan in the office.

"Oh, don't worry about that. It's just the pipes," Alex reassured her. She reached down and fiddled with the handle until the leaking stopped. She stood back up and leaned against her desk. "You said you needed my help?"

"Yes and I'm running out of time-"

The pipe groaned again, only this time it started shaking until suddenly water burst through the metal and splashed all over the two women. Alex screamed and whipped out her wand to magically stop the water from spreading any further and ruining her office. "I'm so sorry!" Alex yelled. She heard a thud and she turned around to find that the woman was no longer standing. That was because, in Alex's complete shock, in place of what was supposed to be her legs was a very big tail. A _fishtail_. "Oh my God…"

Cassandra's fishtail thumped on the floor. "Don't just stand there gaping like a hatchetfish, help me!"

Alex finally snapped out of her stupor and held the mermaid's arm as she flashed them to her family's lair.

xXx

It was quarter to eight and the sub-shop was settling into a peaceful hum when Max got a text from Alex. He was in the middle of clearing the tables as he whipped out his phone and read the text. Not a second later he hurried to the lair, ignoring the odd looks his parents gave him as he sped past them.

He reached the entrance and enthusiastically yelled, "You better not be messing with me, Ale- whoa!" He stopped to find that his sister was in fact telling the truth, there was a mermaid in the lair. A freaking mermaid. In his family's lair.

Max had dreamt of this moment since he first watched _A Little Mermaid_ when he was seven and stole (borrowed) Justin's wand to try and flash to the ocean to find one. His father managed to catch him in the act and reprimanded him.

 _"Mermaids aren't as whimsical as they appear on movies, Max. The only thing that'll happen is you drown - either by the water or the mermaid."_

 _"It's not true!" Max's squeaky, seven-year-old voice insisted._

 _His father, now amused, ruffled his hair and took him to get an ice cream. The sugary treat tended to his little heart and Max forgot all about his fantasy of finding a mermaid._

Until now, as he watched a big fishtail drying into legs by Alex's blow-dryer. He was staring so bluntly he didn't notice that the mermaid herself was starting to get annoyed.

"Hey, two-legs," Cas snapped. "I'm not an exhibit."

Max blinked a few times. "Sorry, it's just...I thought I'd never get close to one."

"Excuse my brother," Alex said sheepishly, shutting off her dryer after the last scale disappeared. "Max always had this fantasy of finding a mermaid since he watched a Disney film."

"Well, I hope you don't expect me to break into song," Cas remarked.

Max laughed nervously, his seven-year-old heart cracking slightly. "Of course not. Still, it's…" he walked over, offering his hand, "it's so nice to meet you."

She smiled and took his hand. "Cassandra."

He shook her hand, a little too eagerly. "I'm Max."

"Easy there, soldier," Alex said. "The sweat on your hand might give back the scales I spent the past hour drying."

"Oh, sorry." He pulled back and wiped his hands on his jeans. Cassandra went to browse through the things in their lair. "How did you find her?" he said lowly to Alex.

"More like she found me. She said she needed my help."

"Your help?"

"As a Guardian."

Max's eyes widened. "Merfolk know about us?"

"Seems so. I guess word already spread. I better call Justin, he hasn't responded to my text." She scolded, "Try not to creep her out more than you already did."

Max, offended, tried to protest but Alex had already left. He turned back to Cas, who was now turning pages of their grimoire. He walked up to her, keeping in mind of his creep-factor Alex snidely (and falsely) pointed out.

"You have entries of everything in here," Cas said in wonder. "Goblins, demons, angels, banshees...ooh, mermaids."

Max looked over her shoulder as she recited the paragraph.

"In Greek mythology, mermaids are referred to as sirens as they use the power of a sea shanty to attract and drown their victims. In today's modern age mermaids are neutral, immortal creatures and prefer keep to themselves. However, they are still potentially dangerous and should not be sought after. They can be considered cold-hearted as they spend their life in the vast emptiness of the ocean which can draw them away from their humanity."

When Cas finished there was an awkward silence.

Max put his hands up in defence, "I didn't write it."

Cas chuckled. "It's okay. Whoever wrote this wasn't wrong. We are cold-hearted creatures. We do spend a majority of our lives in the ocean, the rest sunbathing by the rocks." Max smiled. "But it left out a few things. Yeah, we can lose the clasp of our human side to the water, but there are times where we feel lonely, and that's what draws our humanity back."

"What do you do when you feel lonely?" he said, softly.

Cas thought for a moment. "Get ourselves into trouble." He looked at her questioningly. "This is why I came to your aid. You see, when a mermaid allows even the smallest human part to seep into her heart, it leaves her vulnerable. It leaves wanting more than what the sea gives her - a chance to fall in love.

"I spent a lot of time by the rocks and one day this girl appears." Cassandra's face lit up. "She has this...golden skin like my tail, and long, beautiful dreadlocks, and her smile...I swear they're brighter than the pearls I collect. I watched her every day she came to the beach." Max smiled along with her. "The Sea Witch found out about my feelings and used them to her advantage."

His brow furrowed. "How do you mean?"

"She lured me with a deal. Human legs in exchange for my immortality."

Max nodded, predicting the rest. "Let me guess, she gave you a limited amount of time for you to kiss the girl?" he chortled at his reference. "Get it? 'Cause…"

"I got it," Cas said, recalling a movie night with her girlfriend. "You're a lot dorkier than you look." She continued, ignoring his insulted gape, "The Sea Witch gave me a month to get to know this girl and not just to kiss her, but to have her admit her love for me."

"After only a month? Yeesh. Not in this day and age." Cas glared at him. "Sorry. Continue."

"If I get Laila - that's her - to admit her love for me by the last day, I get to live the rest of my life as a mortal alongside her."

"What happens if she doesn't admit it?"

"The Sea Witch rips my immortality by force, killing me in the process."

"So...what do you need us for?"

"The last day is tomorrow and Laila hasn't said anything about her feelings."

xXx

Justin flipped through the grimoire, silently grumbling to himself. How did he start his night with most beautiful girlfriend/vampire in one of the most exclusive restaurants in the city to flipping through a questionable book in his family's storage to help a mermaid with relationship problems?

Oh, he knew - _Alex_!

He was dipping into his creamy, chocolate gâteau when his phone started ringing, and didn't stop until Juliet finally convinced him to just answer it. At first, he thought Alex was just pulling a fast one on him - a mermaid? Away from the ocean? Seeking their help? That was far-fetched even for his sister. In the end, Juliet told him it was fine and she needed to start her night shift at the Late Night Bite anyway.

And here he was, trying to find...hell, he didn't even know. "I'm not sure what I'm looking for, Alex. I can't seem to find anything on this sea hag-"

"Sea Witch," Cas corrected.

"Whatever. I just don't know how we can help you. I'm sorry, Cassandra. I think you should just be honest with your girlfriend and hope for the best."

Alex whacked him on the shoulder and turned to her new friend. "Please excuse my inconsiderate brother. I just talked him out of a date he'd been planning for three weeks and he thinks it's more important than saving a life."

Justin rubbed at his shoulder. "I didn't say that! Stop putting words in my mouth."

"Maybe it would help if you search her by name?" Cas suggested.

"Let me guess, Ursula?" Justin remarked. Max sniggered.

Cas crossed her arms. "Are you always this much of a smartass?"

This time Alex and Max both laughed and said, "Pretty much."

Cas continued, "She doesn't usually go by her name. She's very tight-lipped about it. But I heard rumours that her true name is Adrianna."

"Adrianna?" Alex said, doubtfully. "Doesn't sound very evil."

"That's because she was a mermaid before she gave herself to the Dark Realm."

Justin flipped through the grimoire once more, muttering the name under his breath. "Aha! Adrianna the Sea Witch. Born in the ocean three centuries ago, discovered Blood Magic in 1882 and wreaked havoc amongst the merpeople before being banished by the Wizard Council to the darkest depths of the seas. She still lives today, fed by her greed for Blood Magic by striking deals with unsuspecting merpeople in exchange for their immortality."

"You know what I don't get?" Max said, "Why does the Sea Witch want immortality when she already has it?"

"That's a question we've all been trying to answer," Cas said. "Maybe she's doing it to punish our kind for seeking the help of Wizards that led to her banishment, or maybe she's just a bitter, selfish hag that doesn't want anyone else to have a happy ending. Who knows at this point?"

"Does it say how we can stop her?" Alex asked her older brother.

Justin searched the page. "Uh, no. No potion or spell."

"Of course, because that would be too easy," she said sarcastically. "Is there a way to at least find her?" Suddenly the book automatically started rapidly flipping its pages. "What're you doing?"

"It's not me!" Justin put his hands up to prove his point. The book then stopped at the last page.

"Spell-writing," Justin read out loud. "It's a guide on how to write spells."

Max looked at the page. "We can do that?"

"Apparently."

"Are we going to talk about the fact that the book moved on its own?" Alex said, still feeling alarmed.

"Don't look a gift horse in the mouth." Max smiled. "This is awesome. I never learned to write spells before you guys took all the powers." He ignored his siblings' glares. "Maybe we're supposed to write the spell ourselves to get to Arianna?"

"Adrianna," Cas corrected.

"Whatever."

Justin took out a pocket notebook from the back of his nicely-pressed slacks and a pen. "Now what?" They all stared blankly at each other.

Cas raised her eyebrow. "Are you sure you guys are the chosen ones?"

"We're kinda new at this," Alex explained. "You're actually the first person - uh, fish? - to come to us."

"Oh, how about this." Max took the pad and pen and wrote the first line. "We seek a creature in the ocean."

Alex took the turn after and wrote, "So we can find the source of commotion."

Justin was next, "Take us to the Sea Witch grotto, so we may stop her plans tomorrow."

"What the hell is a grotto?" Alex said.

"It's another word for cave," Justin shrugged, noting all the staring. "What? I couldn't find a rhyme for that."

"Okay, so we have our spell," Max said. "Do we all say it?"

"I guess so," Justin said, bringing the notepad to the centre as Alex and Max stood beside him. "Wait, what do we do when we get there?"

"Wing it?" Alex suggested.

"Like the time you tried to convince our Aunt Megan to take a retest and almost cost us our powers?"

"Guys, we don't have time for this," Max interrupted. "The Sea Witch could already be planning her attack."

"Alright, alright. Uh, let me think for a moment." A second later, Justin snapped his fingers, "Oh! We use that spell Crumbs taught us to destroy Gorog. You all remember it?"

"Not exactly a spell to forget," Max murmured. "I had never felt so powerful saying it."

"We just need to replace Gorog's name with Adrianna," Alex reminded them.

"Good. Ready?" Justin asked his siblings. All three nodded and began their words:

" _We seek a creature in the ocean,_

 _so we can find the source of commotion._

 _Take us to the Sea Witch grotto,_

 _so we may stop her plans tomorrow_."

They all looked around, waiting for their surroundings to melt into wherever the Sea Witch was hiding, but nothing happened.

"I don't get it, I thought it was a good spell," Max said, disappointed.

There was a loud sound of fabric ripping and the next thing everyone knew Alex yelled out and fell on her back.

They all turned to her, their mouths dropping in both horror and astonishment. Alex sat upright and looked down on her body to find that beneath her torn trousers, her legs were no longer there. They were replaced by a long, dark green fishtail. Just to confirm this was her body, she made movement and the scaly thing smacked against the floor. After the shock finally settled, Alex exclaimed, "What the _fuck_?!"

xXx

Alex Russo downed the entire jug of water Max handed to her in loud gulps. "I'm so goddamn thirsty!" she growled.

"Yeah, that'll happen when you're first on the surface," Cas said.

"In case you missed it, _Cas_ , I am a surface creature!"

"Not right now you're not." _Ping_.

Alex looked over the jug to find everyone looking at her. "Stop staring, I'm not an exhibit!"

"No, honey, _my life_ is an exhibit," her mother remarked staring at her daughter's - she inwardly chuckled - _tail_. The whole family, including Harper and Cas sat in the living room, watching Alex hydrate like a mad woman - uh - fish. _Ping._

"That stupid spell was supposed to take all three of us to that cave, grotto, whatever. Not turn me into the fucking catch of the day."

"Hey," Cas said, looking offended. "It's not all that bad. The ocean has endless wonders. You can get lost in it for centuries."

"Right now I'd rather get lost in my bed so that I can wake up from this nightmare." _Ping._ "Ugh, hand me my stupid phone!" she growled, the sound finally making her snap. Max pulled the phone from the table and gave it to her. Saffron had been messaging non-stop since she texted him that she was sick and couldn't make it back for the rest of the evening. That was two hours ago. Needless to say, he was not happy. She texted back, _this wouldn't have happened if you fixed the pipes like I asked_ , and put him on silent.

"There has to be a reason the spell worked the way it did," Justin thought out loud.

"Justin's right," Jerry said. "Magic may work in mysterious ways, but it always works. This Sea Witch you're looking for may only want to be found when it's in her interest." He turned to Cas, "You said she was just east of the Coast when she struck a deal with you?"

"Yes, but she hasn't come back to it since. She changes locations every time. That's how she never gets caught when a deal goes wrong. It's like you said, Mr Russo, when you want to make a deal you don't find her, she finds you."

"Okay, so, Alex, you can lure her into a deal and then tell us the location," Justin planned.

"I don't know," Theresa spoke up. "This sounds really dangerous. This woman killed _immortals_."

"That's why we have to stop her, Mom," Justin said in a gentle and convincing manner. "She's not going to stop unless we stop her first."

"How about while you guys find the Sea Witch, I'll try and help Cas with her girlfriend?" Harper suggested. She turned to Cassandra, "Maybe I could speed things along for you guys and we might be able to avoid confrontation with the witch altogether?"

"I like that idea," Cas agreed.

"Good," Alex agreed. "The further away you are from this hag, the better. Ugh, I need more water!" she whined, pouring the rest of the water down her torso. The lack of hydration no longer made her conscious of the fact that she was only clad in a white, now see-through shirt with emerald scales covering her breasts underneath. For the first time, she also noticed the golden pearls around her neck. "Hm," she smiled in appreciation. "Actually, I like these glowy pearls. They look like loose corn."

Justin rolled his eyes. "For the last time, Alex, it's called corn not loose corn."

"For the last time, Justin, it's called fainting not narcolepsy," she shot back.

Max laughed and fist-bumped his sister, "Good one, Alex!"

"Thanks." She shoved the jug at his lower stomach, causing Max to utter a painful _oomph_. "Now get me more water."

xXx

The three Russo siblings flashed to the beach. At the late hour during Autumn, it laid empty.

Alex dropped to the ground, unable to stand with her new lower-half. "Stupid tail!" She smacked the sand with a fist in frustration. "Why just me?! You guys said the spell too!"

"Well, mermaids are cold-hearted creatures, so it seemed like the right fit," Justin remarked. Max "ooh'd" and gave him a high five. Alex sent them the hardest glare she could muster. "What, you mean to tell me that you don't find this the _least bit funny_?" Justin mocked, finally getting the chance use his sister's go-to phrase against her.

"When I get my feet back-"

"Enjoy the swim!" Justin flashed her into the sea with his wand.

"Now what?" Max asked his brother.

Justin took a seat on a boulder. "Now we wait."

xXx

One second she was threatening to turn Justin into a blobfish the next Alex was being swept away by the waves. She felt panic coursing through her human-half as she sunk lower into the water but the mermaid-half caught up just as fast, as her tail reflexively started quick up-and-down motions. Alex let out the breath she didn't know she was holding and realised her foolishness when she could breathe under water because, _duh, you're a fish_.

She looked around and was surprised to find the ocean brighter than she expected. It was at the earliest of a new day, but her mermaid vision helped lighten her pathway.

She swam around, getting the feel of the water. It felt rejuvenating and warm. The feeling it gave her can only be described as if she received a hug from a big stuffed animal. A trail of fish hobbled along past her and she smiled at how small and cute they were. _Huh, maybe this isn't so bad_. She unbuttoned her shirt, ridiculous at the thought of still wearing it, and let the ocean sweep it away.

Alex swam some more, closer to the rocks below where there were rows of colourful, oceanic flowers. She pulled a crimson one from its root and rested it behind her ear. _Okay, I'll admit it. This is actually amazing. I don't know what Ariel was on about, I'd never leave if I was mermaid._

Alex let herself be so consumed in her exploration that she had almost forgotten what she was doing there in the first place. _I should probably start my search_.

xXx

Harper spun her keys in the keyhole of her apartment and allowed the mermaid-currently-human person inside. "Welcome to my cramped abode."

"Hm," Cas said, looking around. She stood in the middle of a small living room, a humble kitchen a few feet further, and a compact corridor that led to three doors - possibly two bedrooms and a bathroom. "It's smaller than Laina's, but it looks…" she saw clothing items hanging around the area, abandoned mugs on the table by the couch and a few unwashed dishes in the sink, and rolled her tongue the right word, "...cosy."

"With my work hours I spend less time in the apartment than Alex, so anything you see lying around catching flies would be hers."

Cas chuckled. "That's okay. Thank you for inviting me."

Harper grinned. "Anytime. I'm not always gung-ho about magic disrupting my life but it's so nice to meet an actual mermaid."

"I texted my girlfriend. Laina should be here any minute."

Harper guided her to a seat on the sofa and headed to the kitchen for some drinks. "Have you thought about what you're going to tell her?" she asked, as she boiled the kettle.

"I thought I would just, as you humans say, 'wing it'," Cas air-quoted.

"Fair enough. Would like some tea? It'll help with the nerves."

"I would love some, thank you. Before a month ago, I never tasted such a soothing beverage. Do you happen to have any green ones?"

"Sure." Harper whipped out a collection of bags like she was bargaining fruit in the farmer's market. "I got lemon, peppermint, mango, apple, raspberry, strawberry-"

"How about just-" Cas stopped her, this could go on forever, "-pure green tea?"

"No prob."

When Cas saw a picture of Harper and Alex posing side by side, she asked, "So…are you and Alex dating?"

Harper guffawed. "Are you kidding? Alex would be that last sort of person I'd date."

Cas shrugged. "She seems nice." She paused, recalling the past few hours, "When she isn't a mermaid anyway."

"Alex is...complicated. We've been best friends for so long that I don't really think about it anymore. She's the way she is, I'm the way I am. We shouldn't work, but we do." The kettle whistled and Harper poured the steaming water into the two mugs.

She brought them over to the sofa, receiving a thank you from Cassandra. They drank their teas in silence and by the time they reached halfway through their mugs there was a frantic knock at the door. Harper almost spilt her hot tea in a jolt.

"That's her," Cas said standing up, and feeling some panic rising in her throat and knots in her stomach.

"Showtime." Harper got up and opened the door. She was met with a young woman about her age and height. "You must be Laina."

Laina adopted the look of a lost tourist. "Ye...yeah. Am I in the right place? I got a text from Cassandra and she told me to meet her here."

Harper stepped aside, "Come on in."

Laina walked into the flat and saw her girlfriend standing in the middle of the room. She hurried towards her. "Cas, what's going on? What's the emergency? Are you okay?"

"I don't know yet." Cas gulped. "That really depends on you."

Laina's eyebrows drew together in confusion. "What do you mean?" She briefly turned her attention to the redheaded woman in the room. "Who is that?"

"Don't worry about her, she's just a friend." Cas took a hold of her girlfriend's hands, bringing them close to heart. "I need you to be honest with me." She squeezed her fingers. "Do you love me?"

Laina took a moment to let the question sink in. She blinked a few times, trying to determine whether she heard that right. "I'm sorry, what?"

"Do you have any feelings for me? Because now would be the time to say it."

Laina blinked again and pulled her hands away from Cas's grip. "What are you talking about? You text me in the middle of the night while I was trying to get some sleep for one of the biggest exams of my life in a couple of hours, so you could drag me across town and have a talk about _feelings_?"

Cas's face dropped.

"Jesus, Cas! The way you sounded in the hundreds of voicemails you left me I was under the impression that you were freaking _dying_ or something! What the _hell_ is the matter with you?"

"Laina, you don't understand-"

"Are you drunk?"

"No!"

"Then I'm outta here. I need to pass the bar tomorrow."

"You won't see me tomorrow!"

"Then the day after."

"No! I'm saying you won't see me ever."

Laina paused. "Are you...are you breaking up with me?"

"No, no I'm not. Laina, please, I just need to hear you say it. Do you love me?"

Laina laughed scathingly. "Are you for real right now? Are you high?"

Cas looked up at the ceiling, then to her again. "I don't know what that means."

"I'll take that as a yes." Laina made way to the front door when Harper blocked her path.

"Please," Harper pleaded. "Just hear her out. It may not seem like it but it's a matter of life and death."

"I highly doubt that." She tried to step sideways but the redhead blocked her again.

"Laina," Cas tried again. "Turn around, I have to show you something."

Laina sighed in annoyance but turned anyway, crossing her arms and waiting impatiently. She watched her girlfriend head to the kitchen, filling water in a jug, and walk back to the room.

"Just...don't freak out."

Laina gestured with her hand as if to say, "just get on with it."

Harper watched with peaked interest as the true drama was about to unfold. Cas sat on the sofa, taking off her flats and lifting her skirt higher. She then threw the jug of water on her legs. As expected, they mutated into her original lower-half almost instantly.

Laina reeled back in reflex at the sudden transformation occurring before her eyes. She looked to Cas's face for, hopefully, a logical explanation.

"I'm a mermaid," Cas told her, as if it's the most common thing to say in the world.

So much for logical. For once in her life Laina's mind drew a complete blank and her brain couldn't form a single sentence no matter how much she tried to rack it.

"Please...say something."

Laina shook her head, unable and didn't know if she wanted to process the incident she witnessed. She dropped her mouth, trying to force words to leave, only for it to be proven fruitless in the end. Instantly, she turned around and rushed out the door.

A few seconds of silence passed before Harper looked at a crestfallen mermaid.

xXx

Adrianna listened to the humming of the mermaid through her spying mirror. The girl had dark green scales and brown hair that effortlessly swayed in the water.

"Adrianna," the girl sang, her voice echoing the dark hollow of her cave. "Come out, come out, wherever you are. I hear you like making deals…"

 _Interesting_ , the Sea Witch thought, watching the girl aimlessly swim around.

"I want to jump and dance and stroll and stuff…" Then she heard her mumble, "'cause I never done that before...no I have not," she finished, almost preaching.

Adrianna grinned wickedly. "Oh, young thing. You have no idea what you're getting yourself into." She waved her hand over the mirror and its borders glowed bright yellow.

Alex found her surroundings fade into another location. She looked above her, noticing a figure through the translucent surface. _Bingo,_ she thought triumphantly. She swam upwards, breaking the surface.

"Hello, child," Adrianna greeted her. Nothing in the way she said it made Alex feel comfortable. Although, Alex was surprised to find a lack of octopus legs and on top of that looking so young and, she'll admit it, beautiful. She had long, dark hair that she wetted back from her face, its length reaching her curves; sharp, blue eyes that glistened against the water as it bowed its tide under their command; prominent cheekbones that would cut glass; and a shapely figure that would make even gay men turn heads. "I hear you sing in the ocean and I am here to help."

 _Yeah, right,_ Alex silently whinged in doubt. "Oh thank Aquaman, I have been trying to call you, hoping for you to reach me."

Adrianna leaned down, tapping at the ground. "Come, my child."

Alex warily swam closer to the witch. Using her hands, she hopped on the stony surface.

"Why do you seek my aid?"

Alex looked around, noticing the potion mixes and ingredients. "Isn't it obvious? I want two feet and everything in between," she grinned.

"Is there someone who has caught your eye on the Earthlands?"

"Who says I need someone? Maybe I just want to attend the Autumn Crafts Festival." She only knew about it because Harper once roped her into going by claiming there was an open bar. She still hasn't forgiven her.

The Sea Witch chuckled, yet nothing about it sounded merrily. "Very well." She walked down her grotto like it was a runway. Her bare feet showing every time her long, lacy white dress swayed behind her. Adrianna started rummaging through her cabinets, pulling out the ingredients she needed. "I will grant you the parts you need."

"The catch?" Alex raised her eyebrow, not being fooled for a second by her 'help thy neighbour' attitude. Adrianna smiled at her; she seemed to be doing that a lot. _Probably part of the charm that seduces the poor merpeople into doing nasty deals with her,_ she thought.

"No catch. A favour, perhaps. When the time comes."

 _Yeah, not gonna happen,_ Alex firmly thought, devising to destroy the witch with her brothers before then. "Of course, anything to be where the people are."

"Drink this." Adrianna handed her a concoction she had just whipped together.

Alex warily grabbed it. "Now? How do I swim back?"

"Trust me, my dear."

Alex almost laughed in rebuttal, but did as she was told. The quicker she got on with this, the faster she could get back to her brothers and give the location. "Bottoms up." She chugged down the drink like a vodka shot, the bitter liquid making her face cringe. Alex waited for her tail to transform, but when nothing happened she looked back at the witch. Adrianna didn't say thing, but a malicious smile made its way on her features. Alex did not like it one bit, and a few seconds later, she realised why.

Her body suddenly weakened, her vision dizzying. "Did you roofie me?!" Alex cried out in ourtage.

"Not quite. But it was enough to lower your senses." Adrianna waved her hand and Alex found herself being pulled back against the water until her shoulders hit some kind of torture wall. The chains moved on their own, looping through the bars and firmly keeping her hands on either side of her head.

"What are you doing?!" she yelled, her tail moving in the water underneath. It was a moot point when her hands were tied.

Adrianna's venomous laugh echoed the cave. "You think I don't know who you are... _Guardian_?" The Wizard girl looked at her in shock. "Don't you know? Word spreads fast in the magical community."

Alex, breathing heavily in panic, shook her hands to try and free herself from the chains. "My brothers know where I am, they'll come find me and then you'll be sorry!"

"My dear, I'm counting on it. But I won't be the sorry one. Destroying all three chosen ones in one night...I haven't felt this alive since before your kind banished me from my own civilisation."

"You must've failed history. It was your own civilisation that came for our help!"

She harrumphed. "I should've given you a heavier dose for that mouth of yours."

Alex watched the Sea Witch write something on a piece of paper. "What're you doing? What is that?"

"A message. You want your brothers to find this place, don't you?" She rolled the paper and shoved it through a bottle. She then threw the bottle in the ocean and it sped downwards to its recipients. "And once I'm done with you…I'll be finishing the deal you stole from me."

Alex's eyes widened. _Cas_.

xXx

Harper hadn't moved from her spot since she watched Cas's girlfriend make a dash for it. She searched anxiously through her brain to find something to console the poor girl - a sentence, a word, a limerick, anything.

"She doesn't want me," Cas finally said, her voice cracking with misery.

Harper shook her head and said, "Don't worry, Cas. She's just a little spooked. It's completely normal for a mortal, take it from me," she laughed nervously. "Let's just get you nice and dry while we wait for Alex and her brothers to defeat the witch." Harper hurried to her room and looked for her blow-dryer. "And even if Laina isn't interested, that's her loss, you know? You're a great catch!" Harper cringed at the bad pun and amended, "I mean, there's plenty of other fish in the sea!" She cringed again. "Crap! You know what I mean-" She stopped in the living room to find no sight of her new friend.

Harper's brain finally functioned and found the word she was looking for. "Shit."

xXx

Justin looked at his watch. It has been hours and he still hadn't heard back from Alex. He was getting a little worried. Was Alex just messing about or had she found the hag and couldn't get away? Not to mention the sun was going to rise soon. They needed to defeat the witch before she got to Cassandra.

Justin watched Max pace on the sand, no longer able to sit idly beside him. It appeared as though the same thoughts were crossing his mind too. "Max, just sit back down. You're making me dizzy."

"I can't help it. I have a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach."

Justin looked up. "You too?"

Before Max could respond a bottle was shoved towards his feet by the waves. He knelt down and picked up the thing, exchanging a curious glance with his brother when Justin appeared beside him. "You don't think…?" Could this be Alex's way of telling them where she was?

Justin took the bottle from his brother's hands and scrutinised it, trying to figure out a way to get the paper out. "If you get some tweezers out of my bag-" Instantly, Max grabbed the bottle from him and smashed it against the boulders, making Justin recoil slightly. "Or we could do that."

He picked up the paper that fell from it and then looked at Justin. "Why do you have tweezers?"

"Never mind that, what does the message say?" Justin took the paper from him and read on, each line filling him with dread. "Oh no."

"What?"

"Remember that bad feeling in our stomachs?"

Max took the paper from him and read, " _Found the lair. Southwest of the Harbour. Bring Cassandra for backup._ I don't get it, she found the location. This is a good thing, right?" Max said, confused by his brother's reaction.

"Read the last sentence."

"Bring Cassandra for- _Oh_." It finally clicked in Max's mind.

"Alex specifically wanted Cas away from the witch. She would never bring her and risk her getting killing. Which means, she didn't write it."

"Adrianna did," Max finished. "What do we do now?"

Justin's phone started ringing and saw that it was Harper on the screen. "Harper, now's not a good-" he paused, hearing her panicked voice. "Oh crap. Are you sure?" Max looked at him questioningly. "Okay, thanks. Don't worry, we'll get her back." He cut off the line.

"What? What is it?"

"Cas is gone. She suspected the witch took her."

Max huffed. "This just gets better. You'd think our first mission as Guardians would start at level one or something."

"This isn't a video game, Max," he snapped. "Lives are at stake."

"Don't yell at me, I'm not the one who's doing the kidnapping."

"Sorry. I'm just a little...I didn't plan this far ahead."

"So what? We think on our feet. I propose we haul-ass and annihilate the bitch."

"What if-"

"No 'what ifs'! You think soldiers pause to think, _what if he wants to stop for tea?_ " he mocked, "when someone's shooting buckshot at us?"

"I-I guess not," Justin stuttered, never seeing this side of his brother before.

Max grabbed his shoulder with one hand and whipped out his wand with the other. "Cowboy up, brother." The tip of the stick glowed in preparation. "We're doing this."

Before Justin could protest any further Max flashed them both to the location of the Sea Witch.

When they reached the cave, the first thing they noticed was the silence, only the sound of water dripping surrounding the area. Justin put a finger to his lips, instructing Max to stay quiet. Wands out, they tip-toed along the narrow entrance. They stuck their heads out through a leeway and their eyes widened at the sight of their sister chained across the water.

Max was about to call out to her when Justin placed his palm against his mouth, preventing him from revealing their hiding spot.

Alex looked up and immediately spotted her brothers, but what startled her was Adrianna, waiting for them in close range. "Watch out!" she screamed out.

The brothers turned back and found the witch throwing balls of magic energy towards their direction. They easily deflected them with their wands. With two of them and one of her, they managed to throw her backwards into the wall. Justin used the opportunity to send a wave of magic to slice through Alex's chains. It worked and she fell into the water.

Alex swam up in the speed of a mermaid, slowly getting her wits and strength back from the effects of the potion. "We don't have much time, quickly!" She held her brothers' hands and they all turned to the Sea Witch who was snapping out of her momentary stupor.

" _Hear these Russos cry_ ," they began chanting, " _Be gone, Adrianna, vaporise!_ "

Their faces fell when all it had done is caused the witch to laugh in mockery.

"Why didn't that work?!" Max asked his siblings, alarmed.

"That was your plan? To vanquish me with _a child's spell_?" Adrianna taunted.

The three Russos looked at each other, unsure what to do next. Then something caught Max's eye at the corner of the cave. It was Cassandra in her mermaid form. She was being held back by some kind of magical roots that spread from the rotting wall and covered over her torso as the tips shoved themselves together into her heart. These things were sucking the immortality out of her.

"Cas!" he yelled as he rushed to her unconscious side. Justin covered his back by attacking the witch before she had the chance to get to his brother. The witch, too strong for a newly-appointed Guardian, roughly shoved him aside and knocked him out. She brought her attention back to the youngest Russo.

Max ripped the roots apart as quickly as he could and when he was done, it left a gaping, bloody wound on her chest. Without warning, Max found himself being thrown in the air and against the wall. Gravity pulled at his body and he fell sideways, hitting his head with a large boulder on the way down. Through his muddled brain, he tried to sit up, not noticing that the Sea Witch was already approaching him with a jagged dagger. He blinked rapidly through his dazed sight and saw that her hands held the dagger above her head ready to strike him when-

"Uh!" she cried out in strain. Adrianna looked down to find a long tree root from her plague wall was shoved through her chest from behind.

Justin pulled out the root. She dropped the dagger and limpidly turned around. He prepared to shove it into her again when she stumbled and fell backwards. When she hadn't moved after several seconds, he sighed in relief and dropped the branch, grateful for his quick thinking in faking his unconsciousness. Justin then hurried over to his brother and offered a hand.

Max took the hand and stood, Justin's fingertips briefly skimming over the cut on his brow. "We can't relax yet," he said, pointing to a bleeding Cas. They hurried to her side and Max looked to his brother. "What do we do?"

"I don't know yet, let's just get outta here. Come on, Alex."

Max approached his sister who was still in the water and held out his hand. Instead of taking it, however, she swam backwards. "Alex?"

"No." That grabbed both her brothers' attention. "I'm not going back."

"What?" Justin yelled. "Alex, stop messing around. We have to go."

"NO!" she yelled, firmly this time. "Cassandra was right. The ocean has endless wonders...and I'm staying in it." With that she dove into the water, her tail making a splash on her little brother behind.

"What just happened?" Max asked, shaking the droplets away.

Justin struggled for an answer. "I...I don't…" He shook his head, "We don't have time. We'll have to come back for her later." Justin picked Cas up with his arms. "Right now we have another mermaid to save."

Max nodded and flashed all three of them away from the dark cave.

xXx

"What do you mean she's gone?" Harper exclaimed as she put a blanket over an unconscious Cas on the sofa and a towel over her injury.

"We don't know what happened," Max tried to explain. "She didn't want to come back with us." He flashed them all to Harper's apartment, not yet wanting to go back home and explain to their parents why their daughter was still swimming with the fish.

"But she must've-" A knock at the apartment door stopped Harper mid-sentence. She reached the entrance and looked through the peephole. Opening the door in surprise, she said, "Laina."

Laina looked nervous. "Can I come in?"

Harper stepped aside and allowed her to walk through. When Laina saw the bloodied Cassandra on the sofa she immediately rushed to her side, crouching down to her level.

"What happened?!" she asked frantically. "Is she okay?"

"She's dying," Justin said. "But you can save her."

"How?"

"Tell her how you feel," Max said. "You love her, don't you?"

Laina looked at her Cas, moving a stray hair from her face and behind her ear. "I do," she whispered. "I do love you, Cassandra. Please come back to me."

What Laina said seemed to have worked. The wound on her chest slowly closed and her lower-half turned human. Cas opened her eyes and when she was met with Laina's big brown ones she smiled brightly. The two shared a kiss and hugged, mumbling apologies in between.

Cas then turned to her rescuers. "Thank you, for everything."

"Don't mention it," Justin smiled. "We're just glad you're okay."

"If there is anything I could ever do for you, just ask."

"Actually, we were hoping you could tell us how we can get our sister back?" Justin asked. "She doesn't seem to want to come out of the sea."

Cas nodded. "Well, the water does have its wonders."

"That's what she said. Did it already strip away her humanity?" His brow creased with worry.

"Even that takes a lot more than a day. It's more likely that she's running from something. Perhaps there is another reason why she became the mermaid and not you two?"

Max and Justin looked at each other.

Cas continued explaining, "Mermaids are lonely creatures looking to fill a void and the sea is there fuelling on that - call of the sea, is what we refer to it. That's probably what Alex is doing - giving into the call of the sea. Is there a reason she's running from her emotions?"

The brothers thought for a moment before a light-bulb clicked in Harper's mind. "Guys, I know how to get her back."

xXx

Justin and his brother stood at the far end of the beach. He pulled out a piece of paper with a spell to summon Alex. It was a 'call for blood relative' incantation they found in the grimoire. It required at least one of them to draw some blood on the note. The more members drawing blood the more accurate the result. "Ready?" he asked Max, and when he nodded they both recited:

" _Blood to blood, I summon thee._

 _Return home to your family."_

Justin then used a lighter to burn the paper for the spell to take effect. The paper dissipitated into ashes of a blue luster in the air, his fingers magically left unharmed from the flame.

Not a minute later, the sight of their sister materialised on the rock before them. She had her eyes blissfully closed as her hands were behind her braid.

Alex blinked her eyes open when she noticed the sensation of a breeze. Last she checked, there wasn't any wind in the water. "What the-?" When she saw her brothers, she moaned in annoyance. "You can't force me to go back."

Max and Justin didn't say anything. Instead they moved out the way to reveal another figure behind them.

Alex's eyes widened at the sight of Mason, her ex-boyfriend. "What is _he_ doing here?" she said in outrage.

Justin didn't reply and said to the man in question, "We'll let you handle this. Oh," he shook off his navy blue trench coat and handed it to Mason. "You're going to need this."

Mason took it confusingly. "Thanks, but I'm not that cold, mate."

Justin glanced at Max and they both rolled their eyes. It'll hit him soon enough. Hopefully.

They walked along the beach, leaving a distance long enough for Mason and Alex to have their privacy.

"You really think this is gonna work?" Justin asked, the breeze ruffling his hair in all directions.

Max shoved his hands into his jean pockets from the cold. "I hope so."

xXx

Mason took a seat beside his former girlfriend by the rocks. Alex, physically unable to stand and leave, turned her face away. She obviously wasn't going to start, so he took the initiative. "I came across a few mermaids in my time. One of them stole seashells from me once when I fell asleep on the beach," he joked, hoping to gain some of that smile she only reserved for him back. Much to his misfortune, it didn't work. Instead, he cut to the chase. "But the one thing I learnt about them is that they're evasive creatures. They swim and swim until they could no longer feel. Is that how you want to spend the rest of your days? Letting yourself be consumed by the emptiness of the sea? I have news for you, Alex. Even mermaids realise soon enough they need something more. No amount of the water is going to fill that void you built in your heart."

"What do you care?" she snapped at him. "We broke up, remember?"

He looked at her sadly and said with conviction, "That doesn't mean I don't still love you." Mason saw the emotion that ran across her face and knew he was reaching her. "Look at me, Alex. Look me in the eye and tell me you don't feel the same way."

After a long pause, Alex sighed and realised there was no running this time, especially with no feet. She seized any courage that made its way to her heart and faced him for the first time since the breakup. She confessed earnestly, "I do still love you Mason and I always will."

They gazed at each other, briefly capturing the old spark that drew them together in the first place. Their attention was then pulled downwards when a faint glow illuminated Alex's fishtail, leaving behind the aftermath of her original form.

In the distance, Justin and Max averted their eyes with an exclamation of, "Whoa!" from her bare figure.

Mason reached for the coat on his lap given to him by Justin. "Ah," he realised its intent and they both stood as he covered Alex with the warmth. Once she wrapped the belt tightly around her waist, he asked her, "Does this mean...we might still have a chance?"

Alex smiled sadly. "No. When we were together I wanted you to be something you're not. That's why we didn't work out and probably never will."

"But if you give us another shot-"

"You put a man in the hospital." She shook her head in dismay at the memory.

Regret expressed in his eyes. "I didn't mean for it to go that far."

"You're a werewolf, Mason. The qualities that come with it, the impulses...it's something I just can't live with. I realise that now. It's part who you are and what you always will be. Maybe your parents had a point when they wanted you to date another werewolf."

"My parents don't get to decide who I spend my life with."

"I know. That's the one side of you that I do love."

Mason moved closer. He placed his hands on her upper arms and planted a soft kiss on her forehead. Stroking her arms with his thumbs to finalise their encounter, he pulled back and prepared to leave. "We'll find each other again, Alex. We always do."

Alex watched him walk away and felt the void within her that Mason left was no longer there. She sighed softly in content and approached her brothers, who were still looking away. She rolled her eyes but appreciated the save from embarrassment. "Okay, I'm not naked anymore."

They both turned and gave her sympathetic smiles.

Max rubbed her arm in comfort. "You alright?"

Alex nodded. "You know what?" She turned to find Mason at the top of the beach looking back at her for the last time, a mutual understanding silently exchanged. "I think I will be."

She curled her toes between the sand and squeezed between her brothers, looping her arms through theirs. "Let's walk for a bit."

The three Russo siblings trod along the beach, watching the sun peaking beyond the cliffs.

"By the way," Justin said, "I want that jacket back."

Alex scoffed. "Like you need to ask. Why would I keep your dorky clothes?"

"A trench coat is not dorky!"

A seagull flew above; their banter echoed in the wind.

xXx

A hooded figure walked along the Sea Witch's last hideout, the back of his cloak gracefully flowing behind. The figure stopped when they reached the Sea Witch.

A gasp left Adrianna's breath. She opened her eyes when a shadow fell over them. Recognising the appearance, she pleaded and coughed, "Please…help me."

The figure brought out his hand to her face, stroking her soft, young skin with a forefinger. His voice, deep with malice and indifference, reverberated the empty cave, "I have no room for failure." Before she could react, he wrapped his hand around her neck, leaving her gasping for that last breath as he stared at the eyes of the betrayed. His grip bared no remorse.

The sea ran beside her body like any other day.

* * *

 **TBC**

* * *

 **AN:** Choice of song for when Alex admits her feelings on the beach: _Meadows_ by Wild Child. It's a cute song, I recommend it!

I was struck with a surprising wave (hah) of inspiration for this chapter and finished it in only three days.

Also, I have to ask, what was the appeal of Alex/Mason? I never shipped them on the show but a lot of people seemed to like them. Mason had seriously toxic qualities. He was possessive, jealous to the point of acting out violently (he attacked and _ate_ her exes!) and he had small fits of anger here and there. Not to mention he tried to force Alex to open her heart out to him, i.e. without her consent, kiddies! Like...that's dodgy as fuck? I'm usually a ship and let ship kinda person but it's concerning because this was a Disney show and shit like this sent a bad, bad message to impressionable minds. _(Ladies, if he eats your exes, he's a keeper!)_


End file.
